An independent clause is basically a complete sentence; it can stand on its own and make sense. An independent clause consists of a subject (e.g. “the dog”) and a verb (e.g. “barked”) creating a ...

A dependent clause cannot stand alone, though they often contain both a subject and a verb. Where independent clauses express complete thoughts, dependent clauses do not, and left on their own, ...

Last week, we started discussing the differences between a phrase, clause and a sentence. We defined a phrase as a group of words without a subject and a predicate, though standing together to form a ...

Writers choose and build different types of sentences carefully. There are three main types of sentence structure - simple close simple sentenceA sentence containing one clause made up of a subject ...

To many people, the word “grammar” connotes a bunch of nitpicky rules expressed in scary terms and enforced with cruel glee. Dangling participles, split infinitives, misplaced modifiers and assertions ...

1. Relative clauses are “embedded” grammatical structures, contained inside other grammatical structures. 2. Relative clauses play a central role in English discourse. 3. Relative clause knowledge is ...

Sex. Now that I have your attention I’d like to discuss the fact that this sentence you’re reading is not necessarily a run-on sentence because run-on sentences are not simply sentences that run on ...

We are concluding our discussion on phrases, clauses and sentences today. In the last two classes, we compared the three, underlining how a sentence is usually a combination of clauses and phrases. We ...

Today’s topic is going to be a bit technical. Although it centres on three common grammatical elements, it involves some technicalities, the type we usually want to as much as possible play down in ...