Rhetorical Grammar for Expository Reading and Writing In Response to Semester 2 Grammar Assessment

Rhetorical Grammar for Expository Reading and Writing

In Response to Semester 2 Grammar Assessment

Identifying Verbs, Subjects, and Prepositional Phrases

Every sentence in English must have at least one verb and one subject. When you identify the verb first, it is much easier to find the subject of the sentence. The verb in a sentence is always related to the subject. The subject usually appears in front of a verb. Since the verb expresses what the subject does or is, verbs either express:

Action (eat, stop, help, buy, make, do, gain)State of being (am/is/are/were, become, seem,

look, appear, taste, sound, remain) Mental states (know, think, feel, remember,

believe)

Identifying Verbs, Subjects, and Prepositional Phrases

It is easier to recognize the subject(s) of sentences when you find the verb first. The subject of the sentence usually

Occurs before the verb Tells who or what does the action or

express the state of being or state of mind Tip: subjects are either nouns or pronouns.

Many nouns have a determiner such as a, an, or the. Other determiners are possessive nouns or pronouns and numbers (student’s, her, those, seventeen).

Identifying Verbs, Subjects, and Prepositional Phrases

Eliminating Nouns That Are Not Subjects In some sentences, nouns in

prepositional phrases can be confused with subjects. For this reason, it is easier to identify nouns that are subjects if you first identify the prepositional phrase that may contain one or more nouns or pronouns.

Identifying Verbs, Subjects, and Prepositional Phrases

An error in high school should not define the rest of your life.

In and of are prepositions. The nouns that follow them cannot be subjects of the sentence. Once these possibilities have been eliminated, it is easy to see that error is the subject of the sentence.

Identifying Verbs, Subjects, and Prepositional Phrases

Note: if “to” comes before a verb, it is an infinitive. Do

not confuse this with a preposition, which would

come before a noun.

What Makes a Sentence Complete?

The following sentences are incomplete because they are missing an essential element, either the subject or the verb. Therefore, the sentences do not express complete ideas. What is wrong with each one? Mark the box if the sentence is missing a subject, a verb, or both.

Incomplete Sentences No Subject No Verb

What Makes a Sentence Complete?

In your chart: Sentence/No Subject/No Verb

1. Putting high school behind them. 2. Experts who have researched the

success of college graduates.3. On a major area of study. 4. Attending college immediately after

high school. 5. To pursue your own interests and

discover a career.

Recognizing and Forming Complete Sentences

Complete Sentence Incomplete Sentence

Can stand alone Is a fragment; needs a subject or a verb or both

Expresses a complete thought Does not express a complete thought (needs to be completed)

Contains a complete verb May contain part of a verb, but is incomplete (-ed, -ing, to + verb)

Contains a subject Does not have a noun or pronoun that answers the questions who or what about the verb

Identifying Complete and Incomplete Sentences

Write “C” for complete and “I” for incomplete for each sentence below.

1. A young person who is intelligent but does not apply that intelligence to academic work.

2. We associate street smarts with anti-intellectual concerns.

3. Real intellectuals can raise thoughtful questions about lightweight topics.

4. Draining interest out of the richest subjects. 5. Until I entered college, I hated books. 6. I also loved sports novels and autobiographies

about sports stars.

Identifying Complete and Incomplete Sentences

7. Believing for a long time that I was your typical teenage anti-intellectual.

8. In the Chicago neighborhood where I grew up. 9. Negotiating class boundaries was a tricky

matter. 10. Torn between the need to prove I was smart

and the fear of a beating. 11. Street smarts also satisfy the thirst for

community. 12. And in distancing themselves from anything

as enjoyable as sports.

Run-on Sentences A sentence must have a main clause

with a subject and a verb. It may have more than one main clause (a compound sentence) or a main clause and one or more subordinate clauses (a complex sentence).

A run-on sentence occurs when two main clauses are punctuated as though they form a single sentence.

Run-on Sentences

There are two types of run-on sentences: Two sentences that are joined with no

punctuation Two sentences that are joined with only

a comma Both of these sentences produce an

error: a “run-on sentence.”

Run-on Sentences

The following sentences are examples of run-on sentences. In our society celebrities are often seen as

authorities this is an example of the power of image. (two sentences are joined together without any punctuation between them.)

We value logic and rationality, arguments based on logos are often persuasive. (two sentences are joined together with only a comma between them.)

Correcting Run-on Sentences

1. Make a separate sentence out of each main clause:

We value logic and rationality. Arguments based on logos are often persuasive.

Correcting Run-on Sentences

2. Combine the clauses with a comma and a coordinating conjunction. This method is useful when you have two ideas

of equal importance, and you want to show a relationship between them.

We value logic and rationality, so arguments based on logos are often persuasive.

Coordinating conjunctions are and, for, yet, but, so, or, and nor.

Correcting Run-on Sentences3. Make one clause a subordinate

clause. This is an effective way to solve the problem if one of the clauses is less important than the other. Because we value logic and rationality,

arguments based on logos are often persuasive.

Common subordinating words are because, since, when, whenever, even though, although, though, if, unless, while, before, where, who, which, that, whose, whom.

Correcting Run-on Sentences

4. Combine the clauses with a semicolon (;). This method is effective when the two clauses are closely related and you don’t want to break them up with another word. Be careful to use semicolons only when the ideas are closely related; don’t use them simply as an alternative to periods. We value logic and rationality; arguments based

on logos are often persuasive Pizza is really delicious; I want to eat it right

now.

Correcting Run-on Sentences

5. Combine the clauses with a semicolon and a transition word followed by a comma. This method is also useful when you have two equally important ideas, and you want to show their logical relationship.

We value logic and rationality; consequently, arguments based on logos are often persuasive.

Common transition words are therefore, thus, however, nevertheless, furthermore, consequently, and then.

Correcting Run-on Sentences with Pronoun Subjects

Sometimes run-on sentences occur because the writer does not recognize that pronouns, especially the pronoun it, and demonstrative pronouns (such as that, these, and those) can be the subjects of sentences. These errors can also be corrected using the five methods listed above.

Correcting Run-on Sentences with Pronoun Subjects

Incorrect: Killing cats to stop the bubonic plague was a logical solution, it was based on a faulty assumption.

(This sentence is a run-on because the second clause is also a main clause. Its subject is the pronoun it, which refers to solution in the first clause.)

Correct: Killing cats to stop the bubonic plague was a logical

solution, but it was based on a faulty assumption Although killing cats to stop the bubonic plague was a

logical solution, it was based on a faulty assumption. Killing cats to stop the bubonic plague was a logical

solution; however, it was based on a faulty assumption.

Correcting Run-on Sentences 1. Researchers are finding that many of our fellow creatures

are more like us than we ever imagined, these findings are changing how we view animals.

2. Fast food companies are being pressured by animal-rights activists, they are financing research into animal emotions and behavior.

3. Pigs crave affection and are easily depressed the lack of mental or physical stimuli can result in deterioration of health.

4. In Germany farmers give pigs human contact each day, they also provide them with toys to prevent them from fighting.

5. New Caledonian crows make hooks from wire to snag food Koko, a gorilla in Northern Califonia, understands several thousand English words.

Correcting Run-on Sentences

6. We thought tool-making and sophisticated language skills are exclusively human attributes, self-awareness is another.

7. Animal behaviorists argued that animals were not capable of self-awareness they lack a sense of individualism.

8. It is commonly believed other animals have no sense of their mortality they are unable to comprehend the concept of their own death.

Participial Modifiers Participial modifiers, with their potential for adding details and

information, are a powerful tool for writers. They also enable writers to combine sentences, resulting in more varied and concise sentences with less repetition.

Examples of participial modifiers Winston Smith, his chin nuzzled into his breast in an effort

to escape the vile wind, slipped quickly through the glass doors of Victory Mansions. . .

As he watched the eyeless face with his jaw moving rapidly up and down, Winston had a curious feeling that this was not a real human being but some kind of dummy.

Participles such as nuzzled and moving are forms of verbs that cannot be used alone as the main verbs of the sentence, but they can be added to provide additional information.

Misplaced Modifiers

As useful as participial modifiers are, they nevertheless present some hazards to writers. If they modify the wrong noun or pronoun in a sentence, they can confuse and sometimes amuse readers, but they fail to fulfill the writer’s purpose in using them. A participial modifier at the beginning of a sentence modifies the subject.

Example of Misplaced Modifiers

Winston almost failed to recognize her, turning round.

By placing the modifier at the end of the sentence, the writer says that it is “her” who is turning round, not Winston.

Example of Misplaced Modifiers

Armed with jointed truncheons, even the streets leading up to its outer barriers were roamed by gorilla-faced guards in black uniforms.

Because the modifier comes at the beginning of the sentence, it sounds like the streets were armed with truncheons, not the gorilla-faced guards.

Combining Sentences Using Participial Modifiers

Combine each pair of sentences into a single sentence using participial modifiers. Punctuate the participial phrases with commas if needed. Notice that some pairs of sentences can be combined in two different ways while others can be combined logically only in one way.

Combining Sentences Using Participial Modifiers

1. The people in the room were watching the Hate on the telescreen. They were bursting with exclamations of uncontrollable rage.

2. The thought of Goldstein produced fear and anger automatically. Goldstein was hated more than either Eurasia or Eastasia.

3. Goldstein was hated and despised by everybody. The influence of Goldstein never grew any less.

4. People were leaping up and down. People were shouting at the tops of their voices.

Combining Sentences Using Participial Modifiers5. The dark-haired girl behind Winston had begun crying

out “Swine! Swine! Swine!” She suddenly picked up a heavy Newspeak dictionary and flung it at the screen.

6. Winston was shouting with the others. He was kicking his heels violently against the rungs of his chair.

7. A hideous ecstasy of fear and vindictiveness seemed to flow through the whole group of people. It was turning one into a grimacing, screaming lunatic.

8. But in the same moment, the hostile figure melted into the face of Big Brother. Big Brother was black-haired, black mustachio’d, full of power and mysterious calm.