The Structure of a Sentence
The Structure of a Sentence
Remember that every clause is, in a sense, a miniature sentence. A simple
sentences contains only a single clause, while a compound sentence, a complex
sentence, or a compound-complex sentence contains at least two clauses.
The most basic type
of sentence is the simple
sentence, which contains only one clause. A simple sentence can be as
short as one word:
Run!
Usually, however, the
sentence has a subject as well as apredicate and both the subject and the predicate may
havemodifiers. All of
the following are simple sentences, because each contains only one clause:
Melt!
Ice melts.
The ice melts quickly.
The ice on the river melts quickly under the warm March sun.
Lying exposed without
its blanket of snow, the ice on the river melts quickly under the warm March sun.
As you can see, a
simple sentence can be quite long -- it is a mistake to think that you can tell
a simple sentence from a compound sentence or a complex sentence simply by its
length.
The most natural
sentence structure is the simple sentence: it is the first kind which children
learn to speak, and it remains by far the most common sentence in the spoken
language of people of all ages. In written work, simple sentences can be very
effective for grabbing a reader's attention or for summing up an argument, but
you have to use them with care: too many simple sentences can make your writing
seem childish.
When you do use
simple sentences, you should add transitional phrases to connect them to the
surrounding sentences.
A compound
sentence consists of two or more independent clauses (or simple sentences) joined by co-ordinating conjunctions like "and," "but," and
"or":
Simple
Canada is a rich
country.
Simple
Still, it has many
poor people.
Compound
Canada is a rich
country, but still it has many poor people.
Compound sentences
are very natural for English speakers -- small children learn to use them early
on to connect their ideas and to avoid pausing (and allowing an adult to
interrupt):
Today at school Mr.
Moore brought in his pet rabbit, and he showed it to the class, and I got to
pet it, and Kate held it, and we coloured pictures of it, and it ate part of my
carrot at lunch, and ...
Of course, this is an
extreme example, but if you over-use compound sentences in written work, your
writing might seem immature.
A compound sentence
is most effective when you use it to create a sense of balance or contrast
between two (or more) equally-important pieces of information:
Montéal has better clubs, but Toronto has better cinemas.
There are two special
types of compound sentences which you might want to note. First, rather than
joining two simple sentences together, a co-ordinating conjunction sometimes
joins two complex sentences, or one simple sentence and one complex sentence.
In this case, the sentence is called a compound-complex
sentence:
compound-complex
The package arrived in the morning, but the courier left before I could
check the contents.
The second special
case involves punctuation. It is
possible to join two originally separate sentences into a compound sentence
using a semicolon instead of a co-ordinating conjunction:
Sir John A. Macdonald had a serious drinking problem;when sober, however, he could be a formidable
foe in the House of Commons.
Usually, a conjunctive adverb like "however" or
"consequently" will appear near the beginning of the second part, but
it is not required:
The sun rises in the
east; it sets in the west.
A complex
sentence contains one independent clause and at least one dependent clause.
Unlike a compound sentence, however, a complex sentence contains clauses which
are notequal. Consider the following examples:
Simple
My friend invited me
to a party. I do not want to go.
Compound
My friend invited me
to a party, but I do not want to go.
Complex
Although my friend
invited me to a party, I do not want to go.
In the first example,
there are two separate simple sentences: "My friend invited me to a
party" and "I do not want to go." The second example joins them
together into a single sentence with the co-ordinating conjunction
"but," but both parts could still stand as independent sentences --
they are entirely equal, and the reader cannot tell which is most important. In
the third example, however, the sentence has changed quite a bit: the first clause,
"Although my friend invited me to a party," has become incomplete, or
a dependent clause.
A complex sentence is
very different from a simple sentence or a compound sentence because it makes
clear which ideas are most important. When you write
My friend invited me
to a party. I do not want to go.
or even
My friend invited me
to a party, but I do not want to go.
The reader will have
trouble knowing which piece of information is most important to you. When you
write the subordinating conjunction "although" at the beginning of the
first clause, however, you make it clear that the fact that your friend invited
you is less important than, or subordinate, to the fact that you do not want to go.
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