conjunction (the limited edition)

CONJUNCTION

A conjunction is a joiner, a word that connects (conjoins) parts of a sentence. There seem to be three basic types of conjunctions. They are: coordinating conjunctions used to connect two independent clauses, subordinating conjunctions used to establish the relationship between the dependent clause and the rest of the sentence, and correlative conjunctions which always travel in pairs, joining various sentence elements that should be treated as grammatically equal.

COORDINATING CONJUNCTIONS

Coordinating conjunctions may join single words, or they may join groups of words, but they must always join similar elements: e.g. subject+subject, verb phrase+verb phrase, sentence+sentence. The seven coordinating conjunctions in English are:

FOR - is to introduce the reason for the preceding clause

AND - joins two similar ideas together

NOR - The conjunction nor is not extinct, but it is not used nearly as often as the other conjunctions. Its most common use is as the little brother in the correlative pair, neither-nor

BUT - joins two contrasting ideas together

OR - joins two alternative ideas

YET - is very similar to 'but' as it also joins two contrasting ideas together

SO - shows that the second idea is the result of the first

An easy way to remember these six conjunctions is to think of the word FANBOYS. Each of the letters in this somewhat unlikely word is the first letter of one of the coordinating conjunctions.

Among the coordinating conjunctions, the most common, of course, are AND, BUT and OR.

SUBORDINATING CONJUNCTIONS

A subordinating conjunction is a word which joins together a dependent clause and an independent clause. There are numerous subordinating conjunctions. The more commonly used ones are listed below

BECAUSE, AS, SINCE - are used to introduce the cause in a cause effect relationship between two ideas

SO - introduces an effect in a cause effect relationship between two ideas

ALTHOUGH, (even) THOUGH, WHEREAS, WHILE - are used to express contrast between ideas

AFTER - is used to show time

CORRELATIVE CONJUNCTIONS

Some conjunctions combine with other words to form what are called correlative conjunctions. They always travel in pairs, joining various sentence elements that should be treated as grammatically equal. Here is a brief list of common correlative conjunctions.

both . . . and	neither . . . nor
not only . . . but also	whether . . . or
not . . . but	as . . . as
either . . . or

Conclution

As their name implies, conjunctions join together elements of thought: words, phrases, sentences, and paragraphs.

Coordinating conjunctions are the simplest kind, and they denote equality of relationship between the ideas they join. Coordinating conjunctions are sometimes called the FANBOYS because that is an acronym for them:

For And Nor But Or Yet So

Their relatives, correlative conjunctions, not only denote equality, but they also make the joining tighter and more emphatic.

Coordinating Conjunctions	Correlative Conjunctions
and but or nor for so yet	both . . . and not only . . . but also either . . . or neither . . . nor whether . . . or just as . . . so too

Examples:

John and Sally built a fish pond.

The train was late, and Tom was tired.

Just as the smell of baking brought back memories, so too did the taste of the cider.

Coordinating and correlative conjunctions are great when two ideas are of the same importance, but many times one idea is more important than another. Subordinating conjunctions allow a writer to show which idea is more and which is less important. The idea in the main clause is the more important, while the idea in the subordinate clause (made subordinate by the subordinating conjunction) is less important. The subordinate clause supplies a time, reason, condition, and so on for the main clause.

Subordinating Conjunctions
Time	Reason	Concession	Place	Condition	Manner
after before since when whenever while until as as . . . as once	because since so that in order that why	although though even though while	where wherever	if unless until in case provided that assuming that even if	as if as though how

Examples:

Sally steamed the corn while Fred fried the steaks.

After the rain stopped, the dog ran into the mud to play.

The snowman melted because the sun came out.

Even though John fell asleep, the telephone salesman kept talking.