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Which is correct: 'I want to know what he is doing.' or 'I want to know what is he doing.'
I think the former is correct; however, I am not sure because I learned writing for ages.
If both are correct, please explain what is different in their semantic.
Thank you in advance,
24. März 2009 17:12
Antworten · 2
2
Hi Socko
Grammatically correct is: 'I want to know what he is doing.' That is a statement not a question.
If you are speaking... and you are watching him do something, and you're talking to your friend, you could say "I want to know .....[pause] what is he doing?" which is basically two sentences, and ends in a question. Sometimes people write in a casual way to imitate how they speak, such as in email or on Instant Messenger conversations, and in that context this is perfectly understandable. But technically it's not grammatically correct.
----
Added a bit extra:
Your question makes me think of a song that shows the sentence construction you're asking about. A pop song song called "Pure Energy" has a refrain (the part of the song that repeats) that says:
"I wanna know what you're thinking
there are some things you can't hide
I wanna know what you're feeling
tell me what's on your mind. "
("wanna" is spoken slang for "want to")
You can hear it yourself at this video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsHdea5SRjU (the refrain starts at the 1:24 mark). Perhaps hearing this song will help you.
24. März 2009
1
“I want to know what he is doing." is correct because word "what" is here as a relative pronoun not question word.
24. März 2009
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Socko
Sprachfähigkeiten
Englisch, Japanisch, Thailändisch
Lernsprache
Englisch, Japanisch
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