Musing on grammar.
Is it actually grammatically correct to use "whose" as a possessive pronouns for an inanimate thing? I mean, people do it ALL THE TIME, but it always bugs me SO MUCH whenever I see it. It just doesn't seem like it's accurate! Like you would say, "the box which sits on my desk," and not, "the box who sits on my desk." So why do people say things like, "the box whose lid won't open"? Unfortunately which's isn't really a word either so I'm always stuck rewording these things into something more like "the box which has a lid that won't open."
Is "whose" actually gramatically accurate here at all? It just seems so weird because, you know, a box is not a who. You wouldn't say, "Katherine which was my best friend," you'd say, "Katherine who was my best friend." So why is the box different from the Katherine?
idk, just some random musing because I ended up writing a sentence that I consciously had to write around a "whose" for, involving an island city which has tourism as a source of income (rather than "whose source of income is tourism").
Is "whose" actually gramatically accurate here at all? It just seems so weird because, you know, a box is not a who. You wouldn't say, "Katherine which was my best friend," you'd say, "Katherine who was my best friend." So why is the box different from the Katherine?
idk, just some random musing because I ended up writing a sentence that I consciously had to write around a "whose" for, involving an island city which has tourism as a source of income (rather than "whose source of income is tourism").