Clear references in Portuguese: cujo, em que and o que

Level B2

Clear references in Portuguese: cujo, em que and o que

You will edit a short message about a library report. The aim is to let the reader identify the owner, place or event without guessing. First follow the message, then trace its references, rewrite an ambiguous draft and apply the choices to a school report. Allow about twelve minutes for careful reading, or twenty with listening and your own rewrite.

Start with the reference, then choose the wording

Meu/minha means my and agrees with the following noun; seu/sua can mean your, his or her depending on context. Dele means his and dela means her, placed after the noun. These forms help only when the person they refer to is clear. A named owner can be clearer still. Que can already link a noun to a description: a pessoa que trabalha, the person who works. In an email, recover the request, reason and deadline before polishing the style. Gostaria de solicitar means I would like to request; agradeço means thank you. We are refining the references inside such a message, not learning a new email formula.

Read one connected message

Ana sends Clara a report about the library. The document explains the rooms’ problems; the library needs repairs and is Ana’s workplace. Clara received the report yesterday, and that receipt helped Ana. The text does not say what Clara decided or whether any repairs began. Read the three audio lines in order, then listen again: which building owns the rooms, where does Ana work, and what helped her?

Here is all the vocabulary needed for this message: enviou = sent, relatório = report, sobre = about, biblioteca = library, documento = document, explica = explains, problemas = problems, salas = rooms, precisam de = need, reparos = repairs, é = is, lugar = place, trabalha = works, recebeu = received, ontem = yesterday, ajudou = helped. A before Clara marks the recipient, to Clara; a before biblioteca is the feminine article. O, os and as mean the, with gender and number agreement; das is de + as, here of the rooms. Ana and Clara are names. Cujo, em que and o que are explained next; do not guess their referents from an English word alone.

Whose rooms? Agreement follows the next noun

In a biblioteca, cujas salas…, the rooms belong to or form part of the library. Cujo links that relationship without repeating da biblioteca. Its ending follows the noun AFTER it: cujo autor (masculine singular), cuja autora (feminine singular), cujos autores (masculine plural), cujas salas (feminine plural). The owner does not control this ending: proposta is feminine but we say a proposta, cujos autores… because autores is masculine plural. There is no article between cujo and the following noun: cujas salas, not cujas as salas. English whose does not show these distinctions. In the template, possuidor means owner and nome means noun.

The three extra lines are independent examples, not more facts about Ana’s message. Leu = read, proposta = written proposal, autor/autora = male/female author, autores = authors, trabalham = work with a plural subject, na = em + a, at/in the library. Compare each ending with the next noun, then listen. You can often state the possession in two sentences instead; choose the version that keeps the meaning easy to follow. Cujo is particularly useful in edited writing and need not replace every everyday possessive.

possuidor, cujo / cuja / cujos / cujas nome …

A place and a whole event are different references

Em que in o lugar em que Ana trabalha means in/at which. Rebuild the connection: Ana trabalha nesse lugar, Ana works in that place. The em belongs to this relation; em que is not a replacement for every que. For example, o relatório que Clara leu means the report that Clara read and does not need em. Nesse lugar means in that place.

After the comma, o que in Clara recebeu o relatório ontem, o que ajudou Ana refers to the whole fact that Clara received it yesterday. It does not mean that relatório is the noun modified by que. English can use which for both a noun and an entire fact; Portuguese distinguishes these examples. This o que is also different from the question o que? meaning what? Ask what happened, then identify what the comment is about. If two events could be meant, write the intended event explicitly rather than relying on o que.

Recognize a formal alternative

In the formal line, o qual points back to the masculine singular relatório: the report explains the rooms’ problems. You may encounter a qual, os quais and as quais with other antecedents. Here the agreement looks back to the named antecedent, unlike cujo, whose ending follows the next noun. Recognize o qual in this text; producing substitutions is not a goal. It is not interchangeable with every que, and it does not replace the whole-event o que in our message. A clear sentence with que or two shorter sentences can be equally suitable.

Guided edit: name the owner

The first line is an intentionally incomplete draft: Ana enviou a Clara seu relatório. Read it without supplying extra context. Is the report Ana’s or Clara’s? The sentence alone does not settle that. Seu is not automatically wrong; the problem is a reader who cannot identify its owner.

Now the writer confirms that the report belongs to Ana. Rewrite the draft so that the owner and the recipient are explicit. Try before reading the second audio line. One solution is O relatório é de Ana. Ana enviou o documento a Clara. De Ana means Ana’s. Repeating Ana here avoids giving ela or dela two possible referents. If the writer meant Clara’s report, use de Clara instead; do not silently change the intended owner. A more elegant relative is useful only if it preserves that clarity.

Transfer: edit a different report

A new case: Clara writes her own report about a school where she works. The school’s rooms need repairs. Ana receives this report, and that event helps Clara. Escola means school; escreveu means wrote. Everything else has appeared above. Before playing the two model lines, write a short connected message with those facts. Identify the owner of salas with cujo, connect the workplace with em que, and link the final event with o que. Then add a sentence naming the report’s owner explicitly. The models give one possible opening; your order and wording may differ.

Check your version against the facts, not just the endings: cujas points from school to its rooms; em que points to the workplace; o que comments on Ana receiving the report. Each name or pronoun must have a clear referent. For further practice, expand your message to about sixty words and explain why you chose one repeated name. The core check is simple: whose noun, which place, which event? If the answer is unclear, repeat the noun or split the sentence. Do not add an outcome the source never states.

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