Grammar rules - what are the rules for using who vs. whom?

Question

My tiny brain figured it out YEARS ago, and you can earn TEN points if you can explain it succinctly!

God Lord, the answers SO far are horrible!

One of you wrote, "Snow White decided to eat Cuba, whom/who is her arch nemesis' cat."

Rule ONE: you don't use WHO/WHOM for non-human entities!

In YOUR case, Snow White decided to eat Cuba, that is the cat of her arch nemesis. You use THAT for non-human entities, Dear.

It was a LOUSY example, too!

So far, Marko has the CLOSEST answer to being the correct one, but it STILL comes up a little short.

Looks like Dollhouse cracked open her grammar book. A little too wordy, but this person gets MY thumbs-up vote SO far. This particular answer is not the RIGHT answer SO far, however.

The answer is that the English language is ALWAYS reversible.

I am it.

It is I.

Do you know him?

Is he someone whom you know?

Crud! My tiny brain can't think of any other examples. Too bad there is NO BEST ANSWER available for this question. Were it so, THAT would be MY selection!

Answer 1

"Who" refers to the person who is doing something - it's a direct object pronoun.

"Whom" refers to the person having something done to him - it's an indirect object pronoun.

For example: Who is speaking? I'm speaking. To whom am I speaking? I'm speaking to you.

It's the same difference between "I" and "me", "he" and "him", etc.

Answer 2

Using Whom And Who

Answer 3

'Who' is used as the nominative pronoun, either as a relative or interrogatory. That is, it functions as the subject or predicate nominative.

"Whom' is the objective pronoun, also either relative or interrogatory. It functions as the direct object of a verb or object of a preposition.

The main problem ih determining usage is that the objective 'whom' often ends up in a position in a sentence typically occupied by a nominative subject.

Whom did you call? - Most of the time, you'll hear or see 'Who' in this construction. Yet the sentence really analyzes as 'You did call whom'. This helps show that the 'whom' is the direct object of 'did call', but people expect the subject to be first - so they use 'who'.

Answer 4

Well, I guess an important thing to know is that they are going to eventually take "whom" out of the dictionary.

When saying who or whom, try testing your sentences out.

"Snow White decided to eat Cuba, whom/who is her arch nemesis' cat."

You say who when he or she can replace the word who, while still roughly being grammatically correct. so it would be who.

"Snow White decided to eat Cuba, who is her arch nemesis' cat."

another example:

"She the women into her house, regardless of whom/who she was, because she was crazy"

He or she would not fit there, so it would be whom.

"She the women into her house, regardless of whom she was, because she was crazy"

Answer 5

Here is the test, plug in a name for that who or whom. Say your sentence is "Who moved my cheese?" So you change it to "Jeff moved my cheese," and it sounds fine. But if you said, " To whom did you give the money?" and changed it to "To Jeff did you give the money?", it makes no sense. With the word who in a sentence it can be replaced with a name, and for whom in a sentence, it cannot be replaced with a name.

Answer 6

Whom is more common in UK English, particularly after a preposition (with whom, from whom etc).
In the US, who is more common (whom has an "affected" air to its usage and is considered stilted).

The general rules for UK English are that whom is correct when following a preposition (with, from, to, of).

Answer 7

Who is subject. Like in Who is here? I am here. I is the subject, so is who.

In other cases, it's whom.
Ex: for whom the bell tolls. the bell tolls for him. Him is not a subject.

Answer 8

It's a matter of subject. If you are asking "Who will you be talking to?", who is not an adverb.