WHAT IS IT YOU WANT? (relative clause question) – English Grammar Profiler

Let’s analyse questions that have relative clauses to give emphasis.  So usually, we would say something like:

What do we want to ask?  What are we trying to find out here?

You can see the normal auxiliary verbs ‘be’ and ‘do’ get removed and relative clauses are added in the EXPERT EXAMPLES:

What is it that we want to ask? What is it we‘re trying to find out here?

TED

GSE 71 B2+

ask questions with ‘is it/was it’ and complement clauses.

An iWeb search for:

Wh* _VB it _P _V

1 WHAT IS IT YOU WANT 501    What is it you want? 2 WHAT IS IT YOU ARE 191 3 WHAT IS IT YOU ‘RE 156 4 WHAT IS IT THEY SAY 123 5 WHAT IS IT YOU DO 119 6 WHAT IS IT WE ARE 68 7 WHAT IS IT YOU ASK 68 8 WHAT IS IT YOU LIKE 67 9 WHAT IS IT WE ‘RE 60 10 WHAT IS IT YOU NEED 59 11 WHAT IS IT YOU THINK 55 12 WHAT WAS IT YOU WANTED 55 13 WHAT IS IT YOU HAVE 54 14 WHO WAS IT WHO SAID 52 15 WHAT IS IT THEY ARE 48 16 WHAT WAS IT YOU WERE 47 17 WHAT IS IT YOU WOULD 45 18 WHAT IS IT YOU LOVE 43 19 WHAT IS IT WE WANT 40 20 WHAT IS IT I ‘M 39 21 WHAT IS IT YOU PLAN 36 22 WHAT IS IT I WANT 36 23 WHAT WAS IT YOU SAID 36 24 WHAT IS IT YOU WISH 35 25 WHAT IS IT I AM 35 26 WHAT IS IT THEY WANT 34 27 WHY IS IT WE HAVE 34 28 WHY IS IT I CAN 32 29 WHAT IS IT WE CAN 31 30 WHAT IS IT THEY DO 30 31 WHAT IS IT I DO 19 32 WHY IS IT YOU THINK 19 33 WHAT IS IT YOU SEEK 18 34 WHAT IS IT WE NEED 18 35 WHAT IS IT I NEED 17 36 WHO IS IT YOU WANT 16 37 WHAT IS IT YOU FIND 15 38 WHY IS IT YOU CAN 15 39 WHY IS IT WE CAN 14 40 WHAT WAS IT HE SAID 14 41 WHAT IS IT I CAN 14 42 WHAT IS IT YOU ‘D 13 43 WHAT IS IT YOU SEE 13 44 WHAT IS IT YOU SAY 13 45 WHY IS IT YOU WANT 12 46 WHY IS IT YOU DO 12 47 WHAT IS IT YOU FEAR 12 48 WHAT IS IT YOU ENJOY 12 49 WHAT IS IT THEY ‘RE 11

50 WHAT IS IT WE EXPECT 11

B1: expect, fear B2:

seek