Parallelism is the repetition of a grammatical structure to emphasize a relationship between ideas. Parallelism gives balance, focus, and clarity to a sentence. Parallelism establishes a pattern of repetition that writers can manipulate to create a vast array of rhetorical effects. Examples: Writers can reinforce and emphasize their use of parallelism by repeating one or…
USE A PERIODIC SENTENCE In a periodic sentence, descriptive elements (or details) introduce the sentence, pushing the complete thought to the end of the sentence. This pattern proves quite effective for emphasis or suspense because the most emphatic point of a sentence is the end. Periodic sentences are usually long, complex sentences, the independent clause…
WRITE A COMPOUND SENTENCE USING A COMMA BEFORE THE COORDINATING CONJUNCTION (FOR, AND, NOR, BUT, OR, YET, SO) EXAMPLES 1. Arthur likes music, but Chris has a tin ear. 2. One must humor him, or he will have a tantrum. 3. I won’t go to the dance, nor will I buy a ticket. 4. I…
OPEN WITH A NOUN CLAUSE A noun clause may act as the subject of a sentence, the object of a verb, the predicate noun, or the object of a preposition. Subject: Whatever you say will meet with my approval. Object of verb: The students know what they want discussed. Predicate noun: The important consideration becomes…
USE AN ESSENTIAL (RESTRICTIVE) ADJECTIVE A subordinate clause = a group of words with a subject and predicate, but dependent on the rest of the sentence to make sense. Essential (restrictive) = necessary or essential to meaning. An adjective = a word that modifies a noun or pronoun. An essential (restrictive) adjective clause = a…
OPEN WITH A PERFECT INFINITIVE The present infinitive to have + the third principal part of the verb (or its past participle) = the perfect infinitive (to have written). Perfect infinitives form phrases in the same three ways as the present infinitive: by combining with adverbs: To have talked more loudly, I would have needed…
OPEN WITH AN ADJECTIVE An adjective describes or points out a noun or pronoun. It tells what kind, what color, what number, which one, whose. Adjectives allow distinguishing and specification. They add descriptive details. They also limit or make more definite the meaning of a key word. Typically, adjectives immediately precede the words they modify;…
Parallel structure places words, phrases, clauses, and sentences in a series of the same grammatical elements. Creating parallel constructions shows the reader that two or more things relate to each other with equal importance. Think of railroad tracks, which run parallel to one another. If one track bends along the line, a train goes off…
WRITE A SENTENCE IN WHICH THE VERB PRECEDES THE SUBJECT (ANASTROPHE) Placing the verb before the subject in a sentence is also known as a form of “anastrophe,” the inversion of the natural word order (subject-verb-object) which dominates the English language. The following sentences open with adverbs or prepositional phrases. Notice that the verb precedes…
OPEN WITH AN INFINITIVE Verbals make sentences more active. The English language has three verbals: 1. infinitives 2. participles 3. gerunds. Verbals are half-verb, half another part of speech. Verbals look like verbs, but they function as another part of speech. Verbals are half-verb, half another part of speech. Verbals may function as 1. nouns…
USE STRONG ACTIVE VERBS Strong active verbs bring life and description to your paper by more accurately identifying an action and by adding emphases, connotations, or by merely making a common phrase stand out. EXAMPLES 1. The tragic accident devastated the entire family. 2. The recorder intercepted many of the secret messages. 3. The author…
Shaping identity is at the core of most every individuals being. Identity defines you as well as separates and shapes each individual giving them the qualities that makes them unique in a vast pool of the sameness. Generally people have an undying will to characterize themselves and will go to great lengths to achieve a…
Free The Children literally wants to free the children from poverty, exploitation, and the thought of being powerless. They put these three values into their mission statement, “Free the children from poverty. Free the children from exploitation. Free the children from the idea that they are powerless to change the world.” (Craig Kielburger, 1995). Young…
Description Barn owls live in many parts of the world. Their upper body is covered in grey feathers, dark, ribbon lines and pale spots. An owl’s lower body consists of white with several black marks, just like a Dalmatian! Their faces are heart-shaped and white with brown edges. The eyes of a barn owl are…
Tuesday, October 29th, 1929 was the day of the stock market crash in the United States. Stock prices plummeted, affecting economies worldwide. Countries everywhere, rich and poor, sank into an economic recession known as the Great Depression. Canada was hit particularly hard. Between 1929 and 1933, Canada’s Gross National Expenditure declined by 42%. By 1933,…
A horse travels at four gaits: the walk, trot, canter and gallop. The average horse’s walk speed is 6.4 km/h. At the walk, the horse moves in a four beat succession in the order shown, right. There is always one foot raised and three on the ground. The walk is the slowest of the horse’s…
In films of Adolf Hitler’s Nazis marching the streets in military displays, there is a chilling atmosphere of complete conformity and belief in Nazism. The soldiers seem never-ending in number and proudly sing traditional German songs, marching simultaneously as though they were one single entity bent on achieving Hitler’s goals[1]. In the Holocaust, six million…
The Great Terror that began with Kirov’s death had many far-reaching results. One of the main results was that Stalin’s political dominance was reinforced a thousand fold, but there were other consequences of the purges, both social and economical. These consequences changed the lives of ordinary Russian people to a huge extent – food shortages…
Shakespeare’s plays, Hamlet (1603) and A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1600), explore the theme of conflict and its repercussions, each play highlighting different aspects of the theme due to differences in genre and subject. Conflict, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, is “a serious disagreement or argument, typically a protracted one”, and would therefore seem to…
Electric Charge Charges that are the same repel each other. Charges that are different attract each other. This rule is the same rule for interactions between magnetic poles. Protons repel protons and attract electrons because they have different types of electric charges. Protons have a +ve charge and electrons have a -ve charge. This interaction…
