Whose... word order in questions.
Please, help me. I just found this example on Spanishdict's dictionary:
- Whose are these gloves?
But in my British English student book I have this question which order is different from the example number 1
- Whose T-shirt is this?
I can't understand why elements are in a different order.
6 Answers
They both make sense. Whose book is this? Whose is this book? You can switch them. To my ears "Whose book is this?" sounds much better than "Whose is this book", but both would be easily understood.
Whose are these gloves is not ok. Neither is whose is this book. In English we say Whose gloves are these or just Whose are these. We say Whose book is this or just Whose is this.
The reason is that whose is the adjective form of the pronoun who. Adjectives stay close to the nouns they modify.
"Whose are these gloves" is understandable in US English but most people would probably say "Whose gloves are these?"
"Whose are these gloves" is the word order that I use when I speak Spanish and want to put it into correct understandable Spanish.
Either is correct. As an American, I would say, "Whose gloves are these?" "Whose are these gloves?" sounds very odd, but it is correct. You could also say, "To whom do these gloves belong?", but that would be even odder. Your second example is more idiomatic, at least in the U.S.
"Whose are these gloves?" is okay, but I would have preferred to say, "Whose gloves are these?"
It seems to me that the first example, while probably grammatically correct, is a bit laborious to say and is not the sort of expression you would here in every day English. I agree with jeezzle that 'Whose gloves are these?' is most correct, and is what you would normally hear in conversation.
