What Is A Ambiguous Pronoun

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What'south incorrect with the sentence in the image above? At showtime glance, it may seem fine. Afterward all, it doesn't sound foreign or cumbersome. (Malls and exams are pretty normal things.) But there's something almost this judgement that makes it unsettling to readers: it creates ambiguity. In essence, it raises more questions than it answers. Why? Because it contains an ambiguous pronoun. Today's we're going to talk most how to identify and fix ambiguous pronouns.

What is a pronoun?

A pronoun is a word that stands in identify of a substantive or another pronoun. In virtually cases, the noun or other pronoun appears somewhere else in the aforementioned sentence or nearby in the aforementioned paragraph. Pronouns make our lives easier by letting united states simplify our sentences and avoid repetition. Here's an example of sentence that doesn't take whatsoever pronouns:

"The mother told the mother's son that the mother wanted the mother's son to unpack the boxes."

Sounds a bit clunky and repetitive, doesn't it? Hither'due south how we can change this by using pronouns:

"The mother told her son that she wanted him to unpack the boxes."

In this judgement, "her" stands in place of "mother'south" so that we can say "her son" instead of "mother's son." "She" stands in place of the second "female parent." And "him" stands in place of the 2nd "son." Don't these changes brand the judgement a whole lot easier?

Antecedents

Pronouns (e.g., "he") tend to be more than generic words than the nouns they stand for (due east.g., "Tim"). For this reason, you ever need to brand certain that your pronouns clearly map onto one and simply one noun. That is, you need to brand sure that each pronoun has a clear antecedent. Allow'south accept a look at our mother-son sentence once again as an example:

"The mother told her son that she wanted him to unpack the boxes."

In this sentence, "her" and "she" refer to "mother" – "mother" is the ancestor of these pronouns. Similarly, "him" refers to "son," so "son" is the antecedent of "him."

Ane of the keys to clear writing is making certain that your pronouns have clear antecedents.

What is an cryptic pronoun?

When a pronoun doesn't accept a clear antecedent, you encounter trouble. Equally a writer, you lot might not actually feel it. After all, you should probably know what your pronouns hateful. Only your reader won't, and it can make them really dislocated about what you're trying to say. Here are 3 major types of cryptic pronouns you tin can end upwards subjecting your reader to:

Case #1: The antecedent is missing

Sometimes the antecedent of a pronoun is missing altogether. Bank check out this example:

"The skill of the trapeze artists made it a pleasure to watch."

Practise you run into the problem? We don't what "it" ways. It could be the artists' functioning, the unabridged circus operation, or something else entirely. We don't know because the sentence doesn't tell us. How exercise we set up ambiguous pronouns similar this? Past replacing "information technology" with the actual substantive we're referring to:

"The skill of the trapeze artists made the trapeze human action a pleasance to watch."

Case # 2: There is more than than one possible antecedent

Sometimes nosotros have too many antecedents in a judgement and we don't know which one matches a particular pronoun. Have a wait at this sentence:

"Tania and Ariel went to the mall afterward she wrote her test."

Who does "she" refer to? Tania? Ariel? Again, the judgement doesn't make information technology clear. How do we fix ambiguous pronouns like this? We replace "she" with the name of the woman we're referring to:

"Tania and Ariel went to the mall after Ariel wrote her exam."

We could also give-and-take the sentence like this:

"Tania and Ariel went to the mall after Ariel's exam."

Case #3: There are multiple pronouns and antecedents in the aforementioned judgement

Sometimes we're faced with sentences that take multiple pronouns and antecedents, and nosotros don't know which ones lucifer with which. Check out this sentence:

"When the bottle is empty or the baby stops drinking, it must exist sterilized with hot h2o, because if it drinks from a dingy canteen, it could go ill."

"It" can refer to both the bottle and the babe, which can be confusing for the reader. Of class, in this case, we can guess that the canteen is the thing being sterilized and the baby is the i drinking and becoming ill. Whatever other mode of interpreting the sentence just wouldn't make a lot of sense. But not all cases like this are this like shooting fish in a barrel to sort out. So how do we prepare ambiguous pronouns similar this? Nosotros supercede them with the actual nouns they refer to.

"When the bottle is empty or the baby stops drinking, the bottle must be sterilized with hot water, because if the infant drinks from a dirty bottle, he or she could become sick."

Why it's important to set cryptic pronouns

Ambiguous pronouns don't but brand your reader'south chore harder. They can too pb to confusion and misunderstanding nigh who is responsible for completing a task. Take a look at this sentence:

"The client and vendor take agreed that they will schedule the coming together."

Who'due south responsible for scheduling the meeting? The client or the vendor? We don't know because "they" is ambiguous; we don't know which party it refers to. And what'southward worse is that both the client and vendor could assume that information technology refers to the other party. And so the client could assume that the vendor is responsible for this task whereas the vendor could assume the opposite.

The problem with ambivalence isn't only the confusion. Information technology'due south that it allows people to interpret the same judgement in unlike ways. And in some cases, people might not even realize that in that location's another way to translate the judgement. That'due south why it's important to prepare ambiguous pronouns.

Summary

Pronouns are handy words. They assistance us simplify sentences past using shorter words and avoiding repetition. But when they aren't paired with their antecedents, pronouns can cause more impairment than adept. This doesn't hateful that yous should avoid using them. It merely means that you lot demand to know how to identify and fix cryptic pronouns.
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Want to read about other words that create confusion in sentences? Check out our postal service on how to gear up dangling modifiers.
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