IXL | Identify all of the possible antecedents

The pronoun in bold is not vague. Select its one clear antecedent.

In 2014, Maryam Mirzakhani was awarded the Fields Medal—one of mathematics' highest honors—in recognition of her groundbreaking work on the geometric properties of curved surfaces.

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question

The pronoun in bold is not vague. Select its one clear antecedent.

Medical technology may one day allow a doctor to identify genetic markers in a patient's blood and use them to diagnose cancer before any symptoms are present.

key idea

When writing, make sure to avoid vague pronoun references. A vague pronoun reference occurs when a pronoun could refer to more than one possible antecedent.

When Lisa and Kim finally landed, she breathed a sigh of relief.

The pronoun she could refer to either Lisa or Kim, so the meaning of the sentence is unclear.

Vague pronoun references can be corrected in one of two ways:

1. Replace the pronoun with its correct antecedent:

When Lisa and Kim finally landed, Lisa breathed a sigh of relief.

2. Rewrite the sentence:

Lisa breathed a sigh of relief when she and Kim finally landed.

solution

Look at the text.

Medical technology may one day allow a doctor to identify genetic markers in a patient's blood and use them to diagnose cancer before any symptoms are present.

The text does not contain a vague pronoun reference. The pronoun has one clear antecedent. The antecedent of them is genetic markers.

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Z.7Identify vague pronoun references

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