Dependent Clause - Dependent Clauses and Sentence Structure

Dependent Clauses and Sentence Structure

A sentence with an independent clause and one or more dependent clauses is referred to as a complex sentence. One with two or more independent clauses and one or more dependent clauses is referred to as a compound-complex sentence. Here are some English examples:

My sister cried because she scraped her knee. (complex sentence)

  • Subjects: My sister, she
  • Predicates: cried, scraped her knee
  • Subordinating conjunction: because

When they told me (that) I won the contest, I cried, but I didn't faint. **(compound-complex sentence)

  • Subjects: they, I, I, I
  • Predicates: told me, won the contest, cried, didn't faint
  • Subordinating conjunctions: when, that (explicit or understood)
  • Coordinating conjunction: but

The above sentence contains two dependent clauses. "When they told me" is one; the other is "(that) I won the contest", which serves as the object of the verb "told." The connecting word "that," if not explicitly included, is understood to implicitly precede "I won" and in either case functions as a subordinating conjunction. This sentence also includes two independent clauses, "I cried" and "I didn't faint," connected by the coordinating conjunction "but." The first dependent clause, together with its object (the second dependent clause), adverbially modifies the verbs of both main clauses.

Read more about this topic:  Dependent Clause

Famous quotes containing the words dependent, sentence and/or structure:

    One of the baffling things about life is that the purposes of institutions may be ideal, while their administration, dependent upon the faults and weaknesses of human beings, may be bad.
    Mary Barnett Gilson (1877–?)

    In view of this half-sight of science, we accept the sentence of Plato, that, “poetry comes nearer to vital truth than history.”
    Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)

    When a house is tottering to its fall,
    The strain lies heaviest on the weakest part,
    One tiny crack throughout the structure spreads,
    And its own weight soon brings it toppling down.
    Ovid (Publius Ovidius Naso)