Transcript More Sentence Errors

More Sentence Errors
1. Missing or Unnecessary Commas,
2. Misused Colon or Semicolon, 3.
Faulty Parallelism, 4. Confusion over
Restrictive and Non-Restrictive
Qualifiers, 5. Mixed Constructions, 6.
Overuse of Passive Voice, 7. Wrong
Pronoun Cases, 8. Apostrophe
Problems, 9. Tense Problems
Note
• I have changed the order of these errors
from the textbook’s order.
• At times this PowerPoint refers to previous
handouts and PowerPoints, such as the
conjunction and conjunctive adverbs
handout, the concision handout, and the
“parts of speech” PowerPoint.
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1. Missing or Unnecessary Commas
• Proper Uses
– (1) In a sentence, put a comma after an
introductory (beginning) phrase, word or
subordinate (dependent) clause.
– E.g.: To some people who observe a tattoo,
this can signify a form of self-pity or
depravity.
– E.g.: Unfortunately, the latter is a much
more common reaction.
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1. Missing or Unnecessary Commas (continued)
– Some writing experts and grammarians say that
short introductory elements don’t need commas
after them.
– Nonetheless, it’s never wrong to put the comma
in. Furthermore, if you tend to forget to put
commas in with other kinds of introductory
elements (where long preposition phrases,
subordinate clauses, participial clauses), you
should get into the habit of always putting them
in.
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1. Missing or Unnecessary Commas (continued)
– (2) Use two commas to set off a “nonrestrictive” element (more on that later) that
appears in the middle of a sentence.
– E.g.: Dogs, unlike cats, usually love to play in
the water.
– E.g.: Key West, where my brother lives, is
semitropical.
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1. Missing or Unnecessary Commas (continued)
– (3) Use a comma to set off a “non-restrictive” element
(more on that later) that appears at the end of a sentence.
– However, if the main clause’s meaning sets up a
condition that the subordinate clause fulfills, do not
separate them with a comma.
– E.g.: I will go to the doctor, even though I am not sick.
[the underlined portion is the speaker’s comment
about a decision already made]
– E.g.: I will go to the doctor if you come with me. [the
underlined portion is restricting the circumstances
under which the first part of the sentence could
happen]
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1. Missing or Unnecessary Commas (continued)
– (4) Separate three or more items in a list,
compound subject or compound predicate when
those items are joined with a coordinate
conjunction.
– In this case, a comma is optional before the
coordinating conjunction.
– E.g.: An easy route to these levels is to
become a professional athlete, model, or
entertainer.
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1. Missing or Unnecessary Commas (continued)
– (5) Put a comma in front of a coordinating
conjunction that connects main clauses.
– E.g.: She was a good student, and she was
also a good athlete.
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1. Missing or Unnecessary Commas (continued)
• Improper Uses
– (1) Commas by themselves cannot join main
clauses. (The resulting error is called a “comma
splice.”)
– Wrong E.g.: She was a good student, she was
also a good athlete.
– A comma can join main clauses only with a
coordinating conjunction (see the previous
slide).
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1. Missing or Unnecessary Commas (continued)
– (2) A common error is the use of a conjunctive adverb
(e.g., however, therefore, nevertheless) to join main
clauses, with a comma before and after it.
– Note that a conjunctive adverb is not a coordinate
conjunction. Therefore, a conjunctive adverb cannot
perform this grammatical connecting function. It needs
help from other connecting punctuation (the period and
the semicolon, namely).
– Wrong E.g.: Much of the cathedral was completed in
1941, however, the church’s two towers had not yet
been built.
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1. Missing or Unnecessary Commas (continued)
– Right E.g.: Much of the cathedral was completed in
1941; however, the church’s two towers had not yet
been built.
– Tip: Like all adverbs, conjunctive adverbs can be
moved to different positions in a sentence without
seriously affecting meaning. (Conjunctions cannot be
moved.)
– E.g.: The Japanese attacked Pearl Harbour;
consequently, the U.S. entered the Second World
War.
– E.g.: The Japanese attacked Pearl Harbour; the
U.S., consequently, entered the Second World War.
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1. Missing or Unnecessary Commas (continued)
– (3) Do not use a comma to separate a subject
from its predicate.
– Wrong E.g.: Conjunctive adverbs, are easy to
distinguish from conjunctions.
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1. Missing or Unnecessary Commas (continued)
– (4) Do not use a comma to separate items in a twoitem list, two-item compound subject, or two-item
compound predicate.
– Wrong E.g: I like dogs, and cats. (compound
object).
– Right E.g.: I like dogs and cats.
– Right E.g.: I like dogs, cats, and mice.
– Wrong E.g.: Mitch lives in Woodbridge, and works
in Toronto.
– Right E.g.: Mitch lives in Woodbridge and works
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in Toronto.
2. Misused Colon or Semicolon
• Colons set off lists from a preceding main
clause.
• That is, a main clause must precede a colon.
– A colon, therefore, cannot follow a subordinate
clause or a phrase.
• The list may be any kind of clause or a
phrase.
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2. Misused Colon or Semicolon (continued)
• Main clause: list.
• Right E.g.: Alberta has three major cities:
Edmonton, Calgary, and Red Deer.
• Wrong E.g.: Alberta has three major
cities, including: Edmonton, Calgary, and
Red Deer. [the underlined portion is the
beginning of a phrase, thus the list now
modifies (incorrectly) a single word]
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2. Misused Colon or Semicolon (continued)
• P.S.: Colons are also used to separate a title
from its subtitle or to set off headings from
the main text (such as at the start of this
sentence).
• E.g., Acting on Words: An Integrated
Reader, Rhetoric, and Handbook
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2. Misused Colon or Semicolon (continued)
• A semicolon has two functions: (1) a
connector for main clauses (2)
“supercomma”
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2. Misused Colon or Semicolon (continued)
• (1) A connector for main clauses.
• Use a semicolon when the relationship
between the two clauses is so close that you
think that a period is too abrupt a separator
between them.
• The connected independent clauses are
considered part of the same sentence.
• E.g.: Conjunctive adverbs are not
conjunctions; they function as adverbs.
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2. Misused Colon or Semicolon (continued)
• (2) “Supercomma”. If you are listing a series of
clauses with embedded commas, use a
semicolon to separate the lists where in other
cases commas would have appeared.
• E.g.: The judges included Chief Justice
McLachlin, who is from Pincher Creek,
Alberta; Justice L’Heureux-Dubé, who tends
to side with the state; and Justice MacKay,
who was president of Dalhousie University.
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3. Faulty Parallelism
• When a sentence has a compound subject,
compound predicate, or compound elements
in the predicate, be sure that each element
has the same grammatical structure as the
other elements in its grouping.
– “Faulty parallelism” means “an absence of
parallelism.”
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3. Faulty Parallelism (continued)
• Parallelism is a function of word order (syntax).
• A reader will find a sentence with parallelism
easier to read than a sentence without parallelism.
Faulty parallelism forces the reader to shift to a
different word pattern, which slows reading.
• Parallelism leads to concision.
• Faulty parallelism can cause grammar errors.
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3. Faulty Parallelism (continued)
• Below are some common uses:
• (1) Verbs
• Right E.g.: The stew smells delicious and
tastes even better.
• Wrong E.g.: The stew smells delicious and
I like the taste.
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3. Faulty Parallelism (continued)
• (2) Lists
• Wrong E.g.: I can’t decide which activity I like
more: to swim at the beach in July, when the
sand is warm, or jogging along country roads in
October, when autumn leaves are at their
colourful best.
• Right E.g.: I can’t decide which activity I like
more: swimming at the beach in July, when the
sand is warm, or jogging along country roads in
October, when the autumn leaves are colourful.
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3. Faulty Parallelism (continued)
• (3) Prepositions in lists
• Wrong E.g.: We asked for more popcorn,
extra chocolates, and for more peanuts.
• Right E.g.: We asked for more popcorn,
chocolates, and peanuts.
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3. Faulty Parallelism (continued)
• (4) Correlative conjunctions (either/or, not only/but
also)
• Each the correlating section must have the same
syntax.
• Wrong E.g: Either they will stop overnight or fly
straight home.
• Right E.g.: Either they will stop overnight or they
will fly straight home.
• Right E.g.: They will either stop overnight or fly
straight home.
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4. Confusion over Restrictive and
Non-Restrictive Qualifiers
• Restrictive and nonrestrictive qualifiers are
punctuated differently. The confusion leads to
incorrect punctuation and incorrect meaning.
• Your text uses the term “qualifier.” You can also use
the word “modifier,” a term we discussed earlier in
the course. Think of a qualifier as a group of words
that acts like an adjective.
– You could think of the word to mean “element” (a thing)
instead of the more specific “qualifier.”
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4. Confusion over Restrictive and Non-Restrictive
Qualifiers (continued)
• Recall that an appositive phrase is a phrase
that adds to the meaning of an adjacent
noun. It can be a noun phrase or participial
phrase.
• Appositive phrases, relative clauses and
participial phrases are all considered
qualifiers in this discussion.
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4. Confusion over Restrictive and Non-Restrictive
Qualifiers (continued)
• A relative clause is a subordinate clause that starts
with the relative pronouns “who,” “which,”
“whom,” “whose” or “that” and acts like an
adjective, modifying the noun that precedes it. (It
is an “adjective clause.”)
– The preceding sentence has a relative clause (”that
starts with….”).
– See the “Parts of Speech” PowerPoint for more on
relative pronouns.
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4. Confusion over Restrictive and Non-Restrictive
Qualifiers (continued)
• A nonrestrictive (perhaps better called
“nonessential”) qualifier is not vital to
specifying its noun, but rather adds
information that is useful to know.
– A nonrestrictive qualifier is like a parenthetical
remark or aside.
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4. Confusion over Restrictive and Non-Restrictive
Qualifiers (continued)
• Punctuate a nonrestrictive qualifier with a comma
before and after it.
• Tip: Think of the commas as acting like parentheses.
If you can substitute the commas with parentheses
(or if you put parentheses around the qualifier)
without altering the meaning in an important way,
you have a nonrestrictive qualifier.
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4. Confusion over Restrictive and Non-Restrictive
Qualifiers (continued)
• When a nonrestrictive qualifier ends a
sentence, the closing period cancels the
second period.
• When a nonrestrictive qualifier begins a
sentence, the initial capital letter substitutes
for the first comma.
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4. Confusion over Restrictive and Non-Restrictive
Qualifiers (continued)
• A restrictive (also called [and perhaps better called]
“essential)” qualifier is a clause or appositive phrase
whose meaning is vital to indicating the identity of
thing it qualifies (usually a noun).
• The qualifier is essential to defining or establishing
the scope by which the reader must understand the
element it qualifies.
• As a result, a restrictive qualifier cannot have
commas separating it from the thing it qualifies.
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4. Confusion over Restrictive and Non-Restrictive
Qualifiers (continued)
• E.g.: People who cannot sleep at night need
sedatives to get a good night’s rest. [punctuated as
a restrictive qualifier]
• E.g.: People, who cannot sleep at night, need
sedatives to get a good night’s rest. [punctuated as
a nonrestrictive qualifier (but this can’t be
right….)]
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4. Confusion over Restrictive and Non-Restrictive
Qualifiers (continued)
• A nonrestrictive qualifier has commas
around it to indicate its secondary
importance.
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4. Confusion over Restrictive and Non-Restrictive
Qualifiers (continued)
• The writer decides when a qualifier should be
restrictive or non-restrictive. The distinction,
although it is indicated grammatically, is a
semantic one.
• E.g.: Children who hate vegetables should take
vitamins.
• E.g.: Children, who hate vegetables, should
take vitamins.
• Which one does the writer mean?
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4. Confusion over Restrictive and Non-Restrictive
Qualifiers (continued)
• E.g. The Eastwood film that most deserves
critical attention is Dirty Harry. The film, which
is set in San Francisco, explores violence and
urban alienation. [this restrictive relative clause
has no commas around it because it contains the
main content of the sentence. The non-restrictive
clause gives us information but doesn’t identify
the film]
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4. Confusion over Restrictive and Non-Restrictive
Qualifiers (continued)
• In North America, we use “that” for
restrictive relative clauses and “which” for
non-restrictive relative clauses that
introduce non-human elements. (In Britain,
the opposite is true.)
• (Thankfully, we use “who” for any relative
clause if the clause is about a person.)
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5. Mixed Constructions
• This term applies to all sentence errors that
seem to stem from the writer having lost
track of a sentence’s structure, so that the
end of the sentence has little to do with the
first part of the sentence, whether
grammatically or semantically.
• This term serves a general category for
sentences that do not make sense.
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6. Overuse of Passive Voice
• See the “concision” handout for a
discussion of passive voice.
• Active voice: I saw the dog.
• Passive voice: The dog was seen by me.
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7. Wrong Pronoun Cases
• Pronouns in English have cases, forms indicating
their function in a sentence. (English used to have
cases for its nouns, too, but English dropped those
centuries ago.)
• People sometimes use the wrong case of a personal
pronoun after a verb.
• English personal and relative pronouns have three
cases: subjective, objective and possessive.
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7. Wrong Pronoun Cases (continued)
Subjective Objective
Possessive
Sing. 2nd:
I
you
me
you
my (mine)
your (yours)
Sing. 3rd:
he/she/it
him/her/it
his (his)/her (hers)/its
Plural 1st:
we
you
they
who
us
you
them
whom
our (ours)
your (yours)
their (theirs)
whose
Person
Sing. 1st:
Plural 2nd:
Plural 3rd:
Relative
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7. Wrong Pronoun Cases (continued)
(a) Use the subjective case as the subject of a clause.
(b) Use the objective case as a direct or indirect object of a
clause (including after a preposition).
(c) Use the primary possessive case in front of a noun to show
ownership.
(d) Use the secondary possessive case (mine, yours, his, hers,
theirs, ours) after a verb to show ownership. (These ones
behave like nouns.)
(e) Use “who” in a relative clause or question when the
pronoun is the subject of the clause; use “whom” in a relative
clause or question when the pronoun is the object of the
clause).
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7. Wrong Pronoun Cases (continued)
(a) Subjective (correct examples)
I am going home.
John and I are going home.
(b) Objective (correct examples)
John saw me.
John saw me and Maria.
John gave the ball to me.
John gave the ball to me and Maria.
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7. Wrong Pronoun Cases (continued)
(c) Primary Possessive (correct examples)
His friend cooked dinner last night.
Your neighbour is going home.
Joe threw his friend a party last night.
(d) Secondary Possessive (correct examples)
That neighbour is yours.
That friend was hers.
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7. Wrong Pronoun Cases (continued)
(e) Relative or Interrogative Pronouns “who” and “whom”
(correct examples)
The man who loved her is coming to town. (subject)
The man whom she loved is coming to town. (object)
The man whose dog she loved is coming to town.
(possessive)
Who loved her? (subject of the clause)
Whom did she love? (object of the clause)
Whose dog did she love? (“who” possessed the dog)
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7. Wrong Pronoun Cases: Tricky Cases
1. Than/As. Sometimes the choice of case depends on the
intended meaning.
My sister loved that dog more than I.
[implied: “...more than I loved the dog” (I=subject of the
verb “loved”)]
My sister loved that dog more than me.
[implied: “...more than she loved me” (me=object of the
verb “loved”)]
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7. Wrong Pronoun Cases: Tricky Cases (cont.)
My sister is as tall as I. [implied: “… as I am”; “me” is
therefore wrong]
2. Imbedded subordinate (or relative) clauses. A subordinate
clause is still a clause; pay attention to its own structure to
figure out if the pronoun functions as a subject or object.
Joe cooked dinner for Garry and me. [“me” is an indirect
object of “cooked”]
We decided that Garry and I would cook dinner. [“I” is a
subject of the subordinate clause beginning with “that”]
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7. Wrong Pronoun Cases: Tricky Cases (cont.)
3. Gerunds. A gerund is a noun formed from the present
participle of a verb. However, present participles can also
function as adjectives. Figure which part of speech the
participle serves as before you decide which case you need.
E.g.: The woman noticed his limping.
[“limping” is a gerund: it is a noun]
Versus: The woman noticed him limping.
[This sentence means, “The woman noticed the limping man”
where “limping man” is the direct object and “limping” acts
as an adjective]
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7. Wrong Pronoun Cases: Tricky Cases (cont.)
4. Linking Verb. Linking verbs describe states of being (“be,”
“seem,” “become”, “grow,” “turn”, “remain,” “prove”) and
the fives senses (“look”, “taste,” “feel,” sound”, “smell”). A
linking verb introduces words that describe the subject (and
thus “links” them to the subject). Technically, therefore, no
object can exist with these verbs, and thus, in formal writing,
you do not use the objective case of a pronoun after any
linking verb. (“To be” constitutes the major verb in this
category of tricky cases).
The contest winner was I. [not “me”]
Who is there? It is she. [not “her”]
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7. Wrong Pronoun Cases: Tricky Cases (cont.)
5. Whoever and whomever. These pronouns follow the same
rules as “who” and “whom.”
Whoever cooked dinner deserves a prize. (subject)
Whomever she loved deserves some scrutiny. (object of
“loved”; the clause “whomever she loved” acts like a subject in the
sentence, but within the clause, “whomever” is the object)
Enumerators attempt to locate whoever is eligible to vote.
(subject within the clause “whoever is eligible”, even though the clause
as a whole is the object of the entire sentence )
All voters can vote for whomever they wish. (object of the
clause “whomever they wish”)
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8. Apostrophe Problems
• English uses the apostrophe for two
different purposes: (1) to designate the
possessive case of nouns (with the letter
“s”) (2) to designate a contraction (omission
of letters to mimic slurring of speech).
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8. Apostrophe problems (continued)
(1) The apostrophe is not optional for possessive
cases of nouns, whether the noun is plural or
singular. In plural nouns, the “s” for possession
gets dropped; but the apostrophe remains.
That rose’s petals smell sweet. (Not “That rose’
petals” or “That roses petals”)
These roses’ petals smell sweet. (Not “These roses
petals” or “These roses’s petals”)
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8. Apostrophe problems (continued)
(2). Contractions always have apostrophes (otherwise, they
would not be contractions).
I didn’t feel well.
(contraction of “did not”) (not “didnt”)
They’re feeling well.
(contraction of “they are”) (not “theyre”)
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8. Apostrophe problems (continued)
“They’re” (contraction), “their” (possessive
pronoun) and “there” (demonstrative pronoun) are
not interchangeable.
“ It’s ” (contraction for “it is”) and “ its ”
(possessive pronoun) are not interchangeable; “ its’
” doesn’t exist.
*If you tend to misuse apostrophes, take care when
proofreading.
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9. Tense Problems
• This is a greater problem for non-native
English speakers, but even native English
speakers sometimes use the wrong verb
tenses.
• Refer to the advice in the textbook on
common areas of confusion.
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