This time, our back-to-the-basics review of English composition brings us to the
demonstrative reference words—those handy words we use so we don’t have to repeat ourselves to drive home a point and, even more important, to make what we are saying more immediate and forceful. As some of you may recall, the three categories of these reference words are the
demonstrative adjectives, the
demonstrative pronouns, and the
demonstrative adverbs.
Demonstrative adjectives. This category consists of the modifiers
“this,” “that,” “these,” and
“those.” These words belong to the class of function words called determiners, which serve to either identify nouns or word groups functioning as nouns or give additional information about them
(the non-demonstrative determiners “a,” “an,” and “the” also belong to this class). We will remember that the demonstrative adjectives always agree in number with the nouns they modify—
“this” and “that” for singular nouns, as in “this apple” and “that woman,” and
“these” and “those” for plural nouns, as in “those apples” and “those women.”
The demonstrative adjectives “this,” “that,” “these,” and “those” are also called the pointing words. See the big difference these pointing words make: “
That car salesman over there is recommending this model to me instead of
that model over there, but I think all of
these models offered by this dealer are priced much higher
than those offered by the other dealer downtown.”
Look at the statement now without the demonstrative adjectives: “The car salesman is recommending one model to me instead of another model, but I think all the models offered by the dealer are priced much higher than the models offered by the other dealer downtown.” The sense of identity, immediacy, and proximity evoked by the first sentence is gone, clear proof that the judicious use of demonstrative adjectives truly gives verve and specifity to language.
The demonstrative adjectives work as well even if the speaker or writer isn’t actually present at the place where the objects being described are found. When adroitly used in narratives or expository writing, these pointing words can actually allow the reader to relive the writer’s experience, as if the reader himself was present at the scene.
Take this narrative passage:
“
There was this lovely woman beside me at the bus stop during this pounding rain, and right in front of us were
these three men who looked like thugs, eying us with a menace that you could actually feel.
Those moments made me think that it was the better part of valor to flee—never mind what could happen to t
hat woman beside me—but
these two thoughts stopped me from taking that action: ‘What will happen to
this woman if I left her behind?’ ‘Will I ever get over
this shameful act of cowardice that I am about to do now?’
Demonstrative pronouns. When the reference words “this,” “that,” “these,” and “those” point to specific things independently without latching on to specific nouns, they function as demonstrative pronouns instead. This is the case with the pointing words in the following sentences: “
This is the variety of apples I mentioned to you last night.” “
That is the director that launched a thousand acting careers.” “I don’t like
these any more than you do.” “
Those are a few of my favorite things.”
We can clearly see that demonstrative pronouns are particularly suited to spoken prose, when the speaker can actually point to the objects he or she is describing, whether near or far from where he or she speaks. In writing, however, we can’t point as easily to a particular object or noun, so we need a clear antecedent noun to establish the identity of the object that the demonstrative pronoun has replaced: “
The man’s eldest son passed the entrance test to the state university.
That made him easily the happiest father in the small farming town.”
When such a link to an antecedent noun can’t be clearly established from the preceding sentences, it becomes advisable to supply a new noun. This is where the demonstrative adjectives come in handy; they modify the new or repeated nouns instead of replacing them: “
That feat of his son made him easily the happiest father in the small farming town.”
Demonstrative adverbs. This class of reference words includes such adverbs as
“here,” “there,” “then,” “thus,” and “hence.” These words can handily take on the role of those places or situations that the listener or reader already knows, or those earlier described in a narrative and other forms of expository prose, thus avoiding the need to present them again: “As I told you before, I want you
here,
not there. You were a free agent
then, but not anymore. You will
thus be reporting to me directly until six months
hence, when your contract expires.”
This essay, which first appeared in my weekly column “English Plain and Simple” in The Manila Times
, subsequently became Chapter 56 of my book Giving Your English the Winning Edge
, ©2009 by the Manila Times Publishing Corp. All rights reserved.Read this essay and listen to its voice recording in The Manila Times
:Using demonstrative reference wordsNext week:
Using synonyms to enliven prose (October 31, 2024)
Visit Jose Carillo’s English Forum, http://josecarilloforum.com. You can follow me on Facebook and X (Twitter) and e-mail me at j8carillo@yahoo.com.
