News Article

[newbie99]

Could someone explain the following sentence from a news article?:

"THE mother of an 11-year-old girl killed by a lorry driver who was on his mobile is getting behind a campaign to stop phones being used behind the wheel."

My initial thoughts in my mind was who got killed? The mother or the 11 year old.?
I find it very hard to understand the sentence.

[Mamyalynne]

....as you can see. ;-)

[Garaman]

I agree that context makes it clear.

I don't agree with these commas on Togo's post though //"THE mother of an 11-year-old girl, killed by a lorry driver who was on his mobile, ....// which to me would make it the mother who was killed.

[Blubster]

Poor copy to start with....

This reads better IMO

A mother, whose 11-year-old girl was killed by a lorry driver who was on his mobile, is getting behind a campaign to stop phones being used behind the wheel."

[ichkeria]

Actually if you put the commas in it suggests that in fact it WAS the mother who was killed. The sentence reads perfectly clearly and unambiguously given that the mother would hardly be organising a campaign if she was dead

[Garaman]

I thought that is what I said, Ich :)

[bainbrig]

Blubster’s rewrite is far better than any of the comma-ed-up versions. First rule of good journalism: never write anything that could be misunderstood (even by a really pedantic grammarian.)

[bhg481]

If you replace "killed" by "injured", the commas are necessary to avoid ambiguity. ie, the sentence could be read as "The mother of an 11-year-old girl, injured by a lorry driver who was on his mobile, is getting behind a campaign to stop phones being used behind the wheel." OR "The mother of an 11-year-old girl injured by a lorry driver, who was on his mobile, is getting behind a campaign to stop phones being used behind the wheel."

[Garaman]

//"The mother of an 11-year-old girl, injured by a lorry driver who was on his mobile, is getting behind a campaign to stop phones being used behind the wheel."//

Grammatically that means the mother was injured.

// "The mother of an 11-year-old girl injured by a lorry driver, who was on his mobile, is getting behind a campaign to stop phones being used behind the wheel." //

That diminishes the effect of 'who was on his mobile' when it needs to show that it is the main reason reason behind her campaign.

For me, it says what is intended best without any commas.

[ichkeria]

Sorry Garaman somehow I missed your post. The commas indeed are unfortunate :-)

[bainbrig]

Blubster’s the man for me.

[THECORBYLOON]

BHG, this morning I was typing the same thing about replacing "killed" with "injured" but was interrupted and forgot all about it.

[ichkeria]

If you add commas you are actually adding more info about the subject of the sentence.