Thursday, May 24, 2012

MSQ Grammar Lesson #3 Who or Whom?

Rule #1

An easy way to figure out what to use is remember He = who, Him = whom. That is, when you would employ "him" in the sentence, whom is the correct pronoun. When "he" would be used, "who" is correct.
For example, would you buy the car for (him vs he)? You would buy it for "him", so the correct usage if asking a question would be, "For whom would I buy this car?"
The opposite would be if that same person is doing the act and you are the recipient. If "he" is buying the car for you, he is the subject and you are the object. Therefore the sentence would read "Who is buying the car for me?"

Rule #2

Remember that "who" is used for the subject (the thing doing the act) of a sentence while "whom" is used for the object (the thing upon whom the act is being done) of a sentence.
For example, "For whom should I make this check out to?" Here, you are doing the action but we are using the pronoun for its recipient, i.e. the object of the sentence - so we use "whom". You can also ask yourself the he/him question.

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