Clauses of the non-Santa kind
What’s the official term for Santa’s helpers?
Subordinate Clauses.
I hope the grammar nerds are getting a good chuckle from that one. And yes, tis the season for me to write about clauses. Stay with me, because while this topic may sound as dry as your Aunt Marge’s fruitcake, there are three mistakes I correct over and over when I’m editing, which you will avoid making if you keep a close eye on your clauses.
But first… What is a clause?
A clause is a grammatical unit that has a subject and a verb. (A segment fragment, on the other hand, is missing one of these key building blocks, the subject or the verb.)
Independent clauses can stand alone (aka independently) as complete sentences:
I can’t come to the phone. I’m wrestling elves.
As I’ve said before, in English we need punctuation with more heft than a comma to separate complete sentences/independent clauses. We need a period, a semicolon, or a colon.
I can’t come to the phone; I’m wrestling elves.
I can’t come to the phone: I’m wrestling elves.
That’s tip #1. Don’t attach complete sentences to each other with a light-weight comma.
Now, dependent clauses can’t stand alone; they need to attach to an independent clause in order to articulate a complete thought.
I'm wrestling elves who are stronger than I’d anticipated.
In the sentence above, "who are stronger than I’d anticipated" is a dependent clause because it can’t stand alone as a complete sentence. It is an adjective clause providing (important!) information about the elves. The relative pronoun "who" introduces the dependent clause, and stands in for “the elves.” The verb is "are."
This dependent clause is almost a complete sentence on its own ("They are stronger than I’d anticipated”), but in this case it remains only a part of the larger sentence structure, dependent on the main clause "I'm wrestling elves" to express a complete and unsettling thought.
In this case, you might choose to stick a comma between these two clauses to prompt your reader to take a little breath.
I'm wrestling elves, who are stronger than I’d anticipated.
Tip #2: Make sure your dependent clauses match in number and in tense.
(I know! This is getting a little intense!)
When sentences get complicated with many clauses, it’s easy to lose track of subject-verb agreement.
I'm wrestling elves, whose mischievous grin taunts me and distracted me from the lego-based trap it set at the bottom of the stairs.
It’s probably pretty obvious to you that the above sentence is wrong because I’ve forced a few mistakes to make my points. But as sentences get complicated, and you start modifying different things with different clauses, it can be challenging to keep everything consistent.
Here’s what needs to be fixed:
There are many elves, so there are many mischievous grins. The noun and the verb forms need to be consistently plural: “I'm wrestling elves, whose mischievous grins taunt me…”
The sentence is in the present tense, so all the verbs happening at the time of the action should be in the present tense: “...whose mischievous grins taunt me and distract me…”
In this example, all the modifiers refer back to “elves,” so all adjective forms, verb forms and pronouns need to be plural: “...from the lego-based trap they set at the bottom of the stairs.”
I'm wrestling elves, whose mischievous grins taunt me and distract me from the lego-based trap they set at the bottom of the stairs.
Tip #3: Keep descriptive clauses close to the nouns they describe.
Again, when sentences get complicated with descriptions, qualifiers and modifiers, the string of clauses can get tangled. Keep the modifying clause positioned close to its subject so the meaning is clear.
One night, I came across elves stealing cookies wearing night-vision goggles.
The only indication as to who is sporting the night-vision goggles is the literal position of our “wearing night-vision goggles” clause. The way the above sentence is written, it has to be the cookies that came equipped with the goggles. Well that’s ridiculous.
One night, I came across elves wearing night-vision goggles stealing cookies.
One night, wearing night-vision goggles I came across elves stealing cookies.
(An additional comma will clarify that I am for sure the one wearing the elf-catching, night-vision goggles, although technically the above sentence is fine.) One night, wearing night-vision goggles, I came across elves stealing cookies.
If you’ve been speaking, reading, and writing English all your life, you’ll have a natural ear for sentence structure, and probably don’t care two lumps of coal about clauses of the non-Santa kind.
However, when clarity is at the top of your wish-list, it can be helpful to think about your sentences in chunks, watching out that the chunks are consistent, in agreement, and in the right order. Do that, and you’ll have no clause for concern.
Okay. Last one: What do you call elves when they talk back to Santa?
Insubordinate Clauses.
Bahahhahahaha.