Let’s practice using the colon, the semicolon, and the dash, as well as maintaining correct parallel structure while learning new vocabulary words! This post is due Wednesday, 11/31 by midnight.
Directions: you need to create ten sentences using SGGK vocabulary words. Each sentence must (1) use either the colon, the semicolon, or the dash and (2) demonstrate correct parallel structure with words, phrases, or clauses. Please vary your methods. Your final step is to (3) select your favorite vocabulary sentence from the student who posted immediately before you.
Important Notes:
* The Colon is the > relationship indicator, the herald, the “which is” or “because” replacer. Writers use the colon as follows:
1. Before lists (often to emphasize the item or items in the list) which follow an independent clause.
Each camper should bring the following items: a canteen, a sleeping bag, a pocket knife, and one complete change of clothes.
2. To connect independent clauses or to display a specific word or phrase for climactic effect when the second amplifies, defines, explains, or restates the first. (The colon substitutes for phrases like that is and namely and for the abbreviation i.e.. Usually the first clause is general, the second more specific.)
She had good reason to rave: her little brother had broken her favorite figurine.
After three days, the jury reached its verdict: guilty.
* Writers use the semicolon as follows:
1. Between two independent clauses that are closely related. (Usually the relationship is one of opposition with the semicolon acting like a fulcrum on a seesaw.)
A beauty is a woman you notice; a charmer is one who notices you. -Adlai Stevenson
2. With conjunctive adverbs when the conjunctive adverb joins two independent clauses.
Jasper was inordinately proud of his house plants; however, his wife actually cared for them.
3. To separate groups of items in a series when all items in the list are not equally related.
Robyn’s alarming taste in color reveals itself in his paint selections: the bedroom is avocado; the living room is a strange combination of teal, fuchsia, and puce; and the kitchen is day-glow orange.
* The dash is the interrupter. Writers use the dash as follows:
1. To set off independent clauses inserted inside other independent clauses.
Samuel Robert Williams—his friends call him Wizard—runs the most progressive newspaper in Wisconsin.
2. To set off lists inserted in independent clauses.
Women tolerate qualities in a lover—moodiness, selfishness, unreliability, brutality—that they would never countenance in a husband. -Susan Sontag
3. When, after a list, a sentence starts again with a summarizing all, these, or those.
The visual essay, the rhythmic album, the invitation to drop in on a casual conversation—these are the idiosyncratic traits by which television, as television, has come to be recognized. -Walter Kerr
4. To isolate a word or phrase for emphasis or for climactic or humorous effect.
I could never learn to like her—except on a raft at sea with no other provisions in sight. -Mark Twain
5. When writing dialogue, to indicate a break in speech or thought.
“How am I? I’m—uh—well—I guess I’ll live.”
* Writers use parallel structure to join and balance two or more coordinated elements. Writers employ parallelism to indicate logical equivalence, to supply emphasis, and to maintain coherence. Avoid errors with this Handout on Parallel Structure.
* Parallel Structure with Words
The County Board of Supervisors declared the buildingunsightly, hazardous, and costly.
Neither the cat nor the dog liked the new vet.
A kiss can be a comma, a question mark, or an exclamation point. -Mistinguet
* Parallel Structure with Phrases
Low voter turnout prompted new absentee voting regulationsand initiated voter registration campaigns.
I will either take the bus or take the train, but I will never again take the ferry.
The novel is not to be tossed lightly aside, but to be hurled with great force. -Dorothy Parker
* Parallel Structure with Clauses
We suspected that he worked late either because he wanted to get out of making dinner or because he wanted to avoid rush-hour traffic.
Not only do floods lower property values, they also increase insurance rates.
In matters of principle, stand like a rock; in matters of taste, swim with the current. -Thomas Jefferson
