indirect question

[moonlike]

Hi everybody
could you tell me which one is correct grammatically?
1. Could you tell me who is your favorite teacher?
2. Could you tell me who your favorite teacher is?
Thanks in advance

 

[SlickVic9000]

(Not a Teacher)

Both sound fine to me.

 

[bhaisahab]

#1 would be OK with a comma after "me" IMO.

 

[moonlike]

Isn't "who is your favorite teacher?" a subject question?". Because I always thought the indirect form of subject questions is left intact. There's no change of subject or the verb.

 

[spongie]

would be OK with a comma after "me" IMO.

So without comma sentence number one is not correct?

I have always though that we do not make question forms after "Could you tell me..." because this structure itself is already a question, so "who is your favourite teacher" would be another question.

 

[5jj]

Isn't "who is your favorite teacher?" a subject question?". Because I always thought the indirect form of subject questions is left intact. There's no change of subject or the verb.

When BE asks for a subject, there are two possible word orders in the indirect question:

1A. He asked me who my favourite teacher is/was......1B. He asked me who is/was my favourite teacher.
2A. Could you tell me who your favourite teacher is?...2B. Could you tell me who is your favourite teacher?

The A form is more common, especially with relatively short subjects. The longer the subject, the more likely we ar to use the B form: He asked me what was the capital of the former Soviet Union. In all these indirect questions, a comma is not correct.

An enquiry such as Could you tell me? can be added to a direct question, in which case it is separated from that direct question by a comma:

Who is your favourite teacher, could you tell me?.....Could you tell me, who is your favourite teacher?

 

[moonlike]

Thanks dear 5jj for the clear explanation.:up: