'Whose' for objects

I feel your anxiety, Lake Superior gal, but Wesbster defines the possessive pronominal adjective as "of, belonging to, made by, or done by whom or which" and lists as an example, "a song whose popularity endures." So your sentence is grammatically correct.

However, brace yourself for those who will advise to recast with something such as, "He thought of the purse and its contents he had stolen."

Also note the double quotation marks for lakeside publications.

MumblingSage said:

I'm thinking of 'whose' when used in the sense of He thought of the woman whose purse he had stolen.

But instead, it's an object. He thought of the purse whose contents he had stolen.

Is 'whose' used correctly there? It looks out-of-place. What else could be used instead?

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Here we have relativizing pronouns, which is to say pronouns that introduce a relative clause. There aren't too many relative pronouns. You have: that, who, whom, whose, which, why, when and where.

There are indeed some distinctions of use between people and things. For instance, take "the man who died" and "the building which exploded" -- you use 'who' to modify a noun that describes a person (the man), and 'which' to modify a noun that describes a non-peron (the house). Note that you can use "that" to replace either pronoun ("the man that died" is just as grammatical as "the house that exploded"). However, for possessives like in your example there is only one pronoun -- "whose". I know it doesn't really make a lot of sense, but then having lots of illogical quirks and irregularities is part of what makes a natural language like English so interesting/annoying.

MumblingSage said:

But instead, it's an object. He thought of the purse whose contents he had stolen.

Is 'whose' used correctly there? It looks out-of-place. What else could be used instead?

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"He thought of the purse, the contents of which he had stolen"? That's probably what I'd go with.

Either way

"He thought of the purse, the contents of which he had stolen."

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That is a correct construction, but in no way superior to the use of "whose." Consider two examples:

1) "He thought of the purse whose contents he had stolen."
and
2) "He thought of the purse, whose contents he had stolen."

These two examples with "whose" do not describe exactly the same situation, since in the first sentence the relative clause identifies a specific purse; in the second sentence the relative clause merely tells us additional information about a purse.

The "of which" construction is correct and works well in place of "whose" in the second example; however, it is in no way superior to "whose."

In the first example, the "of which" construction would be very stilted and awkward if you tried to use it in place of "whose":

"He thought of the purse the contents of which he had stolen."

Instead, the more natural construction in that circumstance, if you choose NOT to use "whose," is:

"He thought of the purse from which he had stolen the contents."

Personally, I would just say "the purse from which he had stolen." I don't see any reason to specify "the contents," because what else did he steal from the purse, its dignity?

I thought "whose" had to refer to people. Which is for non-humans. No?

The personification of "purse" bothers me. When I see "the purse whose content he had stolen" it makes my skin crawl.

I prefer Chase's version: "He thought of the purse and its contents he had stolen."

rhymegirl said:

I thought "whose" had to refer to people. Which is for non-humans. No?

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No. That's a cherished superstition, but one not supported by written usage. Whose is the possessive case of both who & which.

"Let us, in the name of common sense, prohibit the prohibition of ‘whose’ inanimate; good writing is surely difficult enough without the forbidding of things that have historical grammar, and present intelligibility, and obvious convenience, on their side ...." -- H.W. Fowler

He thought of the woman whose purse he had stolen.

He thought of the purse whose contents he had stolen.

Tell me if I'm alone in this but wouldn't it be the first sentence because he can't steal from a purse, he stole from a woman? Then again, I could be wrong. I'm learning all the time.