Fragments, or Why That’s Not a Sentence

1. Fragments,or Why That’s Not a Sentence • One of the most common grammatical errors is the sentence fragment. • Actually, “Sentence Fragment” is kind of a misnomer, since the whole point is that the construction is not actually a sentence.

2. So What is a Sentence? • A sentence is a construction that can stand alone as a complete thought. • A sentence always has two key elements: • A subject (the thing the sentence is about) • A verb (the thing the subject is doing) • A sentence always has both of these. • A sentence is never dependent on something else to complete its meaning.

3. So What is a Fragment? • A fragment is a construction that is not a complete sentence. • Either is it missing one of the key elements, or it is dependent on another sentence for its meaning. • Fragments are almost always continuations of the preceding sentences. This is why they can be hard to catch.

4. Fragment Type #1:Renamers • Renamers rename or explain the last noun in the previous sentence. • I got a card from my mother. Who is in Seattle this week. • Yesterday I got a package. Two books from Amazon.com. • Renamers very often begin with who or which.

5. Fragment Type #2:Adverbs • Adverbs are words or clauses that tell when, where, how, and why something happened. • I didn’t do my homework. Because I left my book at school. • We all agreed to meet later. After class was over. • The most common type of adverb fragments are “because” clauses.

6. Fragment Type #3-ing Fragments • -ing fragments begin with a verb in the –ing form. • Walking three miles every day. • Trying new thing. • The problem here is that this words (walking and trying) aren’t actually verbs. No, really, they’re not. Trust me on this.

7. So What Do I Do? • The reason the fragments are so hard to find is that they often “sound” correct. • Since the previous sentence provides what’s missing, we don’t hear the error. • What’s needed is something to break up the sentences so you can “hear” each one by itself.

8. The “I Realize” Test • Our book suggests putting “I realize” in front of every sentence in your paper. • I realize walking three miles a day. • I realize because I left my book at school. • You can “hear” that these constructions are not complete.

9. Isn’t that a lot of work? • Well, yes. For a paper about the length of our first one, you can reasonably expect this process to take up to half an hour. There are, alas, few shortcuts to good writing. • The good news is that if you do this consistently for several papers, you will gradually start to catch fragments as you write.