English poll!

[rowyn]

[Poll #1981252]

I have already overthought this question, so I'm not going to explain the background unless someone asks me to in the comments. I'm just curious what instinctive sense other people have on it.

Comments

[alinsa.livejournal.com]

I really can't see how it would be anything but the first thing. Or possibly the last, but that would be my problem and not yours... ;)

I *am* curious about the context, though.

[rowyn]

I use this construction a lot -- "subject verb object, subordinate clause" -- when I'm writing, in the belief that the subordinate clause modifies the subject, even if you put it after the object. But a panel on editing advice had warned authors to be careful of dangling participles, and that made me wonder if I was right about subordinate clauses always modifying the subject. Google gave contradictory answers -- the top hit for dangling participles says that the nearest antecedent noun is the one modified, while the OED webpage says it's the subject.

I figured a poll would be a good way of seeing what actual usage looked like, and if this was something that readers were likely to be confused about. The answer to those appears to be "it modifies the subject" and "no". :)