Tag Archives: whom

Knock, knock! Who’s there?

Grammar, ,

I’ve said this before, but it’s probably time to say it again: “who” is well on its way to losing its case marking. That is, the objective case “whom” is fading, leaving us with “who” for both subjective and objective uses (like the pronouns “you,” “it” and “what”). In conversational speech, “whom” is already long gone, and in all but the most formal writing, at best “whom” is inconsistently used. Anymore, the only place you really need “whom” is directly following a preposition: To whom it may concern.

When I’m editing, I change an incorrect “whom” to a correct “who” far more often than the reverse. Hypercorrection – using “whom” where “who” is actually right – leads to sentences that are both stuffy and wrong. Here’s an example: “Please forward this message to whomever is in charge of purchasing.” The pronoun here is the subject of the relative clause and so should be who — you wouldn’t say “him is in charge of purchasing.”

Here’s a short video I made to explain this to my students:

Who and whom on Biteable.

Bottom line: When in doubt, go with “who.”

Advertisement

To whom it may concern

Grammar Monkeys, ,

Originally posted on Grammar Monkeys on May 7, 2012.

“Who” and “whom”’ cause all sorts of problems for writers. No one seems to know when to use which one, and whether to even bother with “whom” at all. More on that in a minute.

The basics:
“Who” is a subject pronoun. It is the subject of a verb, even if that verb is in a dependent clause.
“Whom” is an object pronoun. It is the object of a verb or a preposition.

The trick:
Substitute “he” or “him” to determine whether to use “who” or “whom.” If “he” makes sense, use “who.” If “him” makes sense, you can use “whom” (both have an M).
– The employee, who/whom the boss promoted after only six months, ended up doing well in her new post. (The boss promoted HE? No, the boss promoted HIM = whom)
– The employee, who/whom everyone said was incompetent, got promoted after only six months.
(Everyone said HIM was incompetent? No, everyone said HE was incompetent = who). This one is wrong a lot — editors change a lot of overcorrected “whoms.”
Continue reading To whom it may concern →