Dependent Clauses
1 Because he didn’t care for the country, and because the beach
had no appeal to him, he decided to travel during his vacation. adverbial clauses joined
2 He married a woman who was very intelligent and charming,
but who couldn’t cook at all. adjectives clauses joined
3 I don’t know when he left town or why he wanted to do so.
noun clauses joined
Independent Clauses 1
I’ll pick you up at eight and I’ll get you back home by
midnight. 2
He decided to withdraw from his physics class, for he kept
failing the examinations. 3
Give me liberty or give me death. Frank 1972, 208
2.2.2 Correlative conjunctions
Correlative conjunctions also link similar words or word groups, but they are always used in pairs, joining various sentence elements that should be treated
as grammatically equal. When joining singular and plural subjects, the subject closest to the verb determines whether the verb is singular or plural.
The most important thing to remember when using correlative conjunctions is that the words, phrases, or clauses that are put together must be the same
type. That means that nouns must be put together with other nouns, verbs with other verbs, adjectives with other adjectives, and so on. This point will
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be more fully explained following the list of frequently used correlative conjunctions.
Correlative conjunctions such as:
1 Both my sister and my brother work with computers.
The correlative conjunction in this sentence is both ... and. This correlative conjunction links together two words of the same type. In
this case, the types of words are the nouns, sister and brother.
2 For dessert, you may have either cake or ice cream.
The correlative conjunction in this sentence is either ... or. This conjunction also links two nouns, cake and ice cream.
3 She wanted neither cake nor ice cream.
The correlative conjunction in this sentence is neither ... nor. This conjunction links two nouns.
4 He did not know whether to exit the freeway at Orange
Avenue or to exit the freeway at Cherry Avenue.
The correlative conjunction in this sentence is whether ... or. This conjunction links two phrases.
5 The ESL teachers are not only intelligent but also friendly.
The correlative conjunction in this sentence is not only ... but. This conjunction links two phrases.
6 My dog doesnt smell as bad as your dog smells.
The correlative conjunction in this sentence is as ... as. This conjunction links two clauses.
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Both. . .and, neither. . .nor, either. . .or, not only. . .but also, not. . .but, whether. . .or, as. . .as
Laurie Rozakis, Ph.D, 2003, 7. While correlative conjunctions are used in formal English, care must
be taken that the first correlative is placed before the proper item. Both parts of the coordination must be grammatically parallel.
She will either pay for the ring or she will return it. predicate
independent clause
While informal English permits this kind of non-parallelism, formal usage requires that the sentence just given be changed to:
She will either pay for the ring or return it or to either she will pay for the ring or she will return it.
Frank 1972, 214
2.2.3 Subordinating conjunctions
