Conjunction English Grammar Rules Examples and Exercises

26-February 2020...........

Conjunctions

Conjunction is a word or group of words that connects two or more than two words, phrases, clauses or sentences.

For example:

Amit and Anand have joined this course together
She as well as her friends is going to invite everyone in this party.
You take my advice but you don’t follow it sincerely.
Either he has taken help from someone or he has done it himself.
Neither Sheetal nor Reema has attended this seminar.
My uncle has not only provided me the details but also guided me for exam.

In the given examples we can see words, phrases, clauses and sentences are connected and they are presenting a meaningful expression.

Importance of Conjunctions:

Connecting words, phrases, clauses or sentences make a speaker link the existing entities at a time. These connecting words bring ease of expression as message is conveyed instantly. It avoids repetition too and makes the communication more meaningful. The objective of these joiners is to establish the relation among them. Although usage of conjunctions is quite common and these words become the strength of a speaker. One should be careful for the correct usage of conjunctions and sometimes they are used superfluously too.

Type of Conjunctions

As per usage, there are three types of conjunctions.

- Coordinating Conjunctions
- Subordinating Conjunctions
- Correlative Conjunctions

Coordinating Conjunctions:

These are the commonly used conjunctions to link the same grammatical terms. This type of conjunctions is placed in between the words or group of words which have similarity. These conjunctions are not at the beginning or at the end of the sentence.

Tea and samosa are my favorite snacks.

Here the conjunction and joins two nouns i.e. Tea and Samosa.

This copy was kept in the drawer or in the almirah.

Here two phrases in the drawer and in the almirah are joined using the conjunction or.

He understands well what I learn everyday and how I implement the ideas practically.

In this sentence, we have added two clauses together using and i.e. what I learn everyday and how I implement the ideas practically.

Important points for punctuating Coordinating Conjunctions.

While joining two words, phrases, dependent clauses and sentences, a comma is not required before the coordinating conjunction as it itself will solve the purpose.

For example:

Akriti and Anushka are preparing for MNS exam.
Aditya or his colleagues will have made this book so informative.
What you do and what you receive in return is the way life goes on.

Here a point should be noted that if many words, phrases, clauses or sentences are there, comma is required and the coordinating conjunction is to be used at last.

For example:

Honesty, Truthfulness and Sincerity are required to get success in competitive exams.
You may keep your belongings in the drawer, on the desk, in official bag or on the podium of class.

In case of independent clauses, the rule differs from words and phrases. Here comma is required before placing the conjunction.

The class got over, so we all came to cafeteria to have some snacks.
The tentative date was passed, so it was preposterous to post the form now.
I really don’t want such ignorance, but you often make it.

Quick method to keep these conjunctions in mind: FANBOYS

F	FOR
A	AND
N	NOR
B	BUT
O	OR
Y	YET
S	SO

Subordinating Conjunctions:

These conjunctions specialize in linking two clauses together. Aside from the fact that subordinating conjunctions show a dependent clauses which is just based on the principal clause. These conjunctions describe the relationship between the principal and dependent clause in a sentence.

The subordinating conjunctions are as follows.

While	As soon as
Although	Before
Even if	Because
No matter how	Whether
Since	Though
So that	As
Unless	In case
As far as	Now that
Once	In that case
Whenever	When
Until	After
As if	How
Provided	Supposing

Examples:

While attending class, I keep my phone on silent mode.
As soon as I came out, it started raining heavily.
Although he has enough amount of money, he thinks a lot in making decisions for purchases.
Supposing you get this position, how you would expand the business.
Until you believe on yourself, others will always take you an ordinary person.
Things will move on, provided you have ability to make them happen.
I wanted to know, how you have developed this confidence level of public speaking.
He behaves in such a way, as if he were the manager of the organization.

Correlative Conjunctions:

The correlative conjunctions are in pairs which join two elements of equal parts of speech. They can join two subjects, verbs or the objects. These pairs of conjunctions are to be used carefully as meaning changes when they are added before subjects, verbs or the objects. The intended meaning is to be brought by giving proper positioning to the conjunction.