Interrogative Pronouns

What are Interrogative Pronouns?

Interrogative pronouns are used to form questions, serving as either the subject or object of such sentences.

The five Interrogative pronouns are as follows:  who, whom, whose, which, and what

Interrogative Pronouns as Subject

example:

"Who wants to go to the library?"

The subject of this sentence is "who," an interrogative pronoun.

Why?

If the question, "Who wants to go to the library?" is answered with:

“I want to go to the library”

or

“Sheila wants to go to the library.”

whoever wants to go to the library, that person answers the question “who?”

When the sentences are thoroughly examined, 'I' or 'Sheila' answer the question "who is the sentence about?"

What does this imply? That is, the subjects are "I" and "Sheila." 

"I" and "Sheila" have been replaced by "who" when the sentences are turned into a question, "who wants to go to the library?" As a result, "who" is the question's subject.

Interrogative Pronouns as Object

example:

"What are we going to eat?"

If the question is answered with:

"We are going to eat bread."

“We” here will be the subject. It is not the object because it does not answer the question “what” are we going to eat?"

The object here is the "bread" because it is the one being acted upon or the receiver of the action word 'eat'. Since the 'bread' replaces or answers the question "what?", then "what" here is the object.

Just remember: WHO, WHOM, and WHOSE are used to refer to people, whereas WHICH and WHAT are used to refer to inanimate objects such as chairs, glasses, and tables.