Parallel Structure

And we’re back.

Welcome back everyone.

We are now onto unit three developing your writing style.

So we’ve talked about the writing process I hope you guys are working your way through each step of

the writing process for each of your assignments or each of your writing projects.

We’ve also discussed how to organize your ideas through clear thesis statements paragraphs transitioning

conclusions and so on.

And today we’re going to begin to talk about your writing style throughout this section I’m going to

give you different strategies for improving your writing style and bringing it up to that college level.

And today the first strategy is parallel structure.

So a parallel structure is is the idea of using the same grammatical structure to express equal ideas

in a sequence.

The purpose is it increases clarity.

So how do we do that.

There are a number of ways to do parallel structure.

The first way through coordinating conjunctions coordinating conjunctions of course are words like and

but yet or and nor to do a parallel structure correctly you need to use the same grammatical structure

on both sides of a coordinating conjunction.

So look at some examples.

First an awkward example and one that happens way too often.

I love to eat and go drinking at restaurants.

So here we have two different tenses of the verb we have before and we have eat and after and we have

go drinking.

In other words we’re using two different grammatical structures on each side of the conjunction a better

way to do it would be I love to eat and to drink at restaurants.

You could also change it too.

I love eating and drinking at restaurants.

The point here being that no matter which way you want to change it the structure on both sides of the

conjunction and need to be the same.

So another way to do parallel structure Well the Sucre relative conjunctions correlative conjunctions

are things like either or neither nor whether or not only but also in order to have a good parallel

structure.

We need to use again the same grammatical structure when using correlative conjunctions.

So exactly the same as coordinating conjunctions we have first an awkward example.

Today’s assignment is neither to solve a problem nor writing a paper a better way to write that by using

parallel structure or a way to make that more clear would be.

Today’s assignment is neither to solve the problem nor to write a paper.

Again another correct way to do that would be.

Today’s assignment is neither solving a problem nor writing a paper.

So to create parallel structure we simply need to when we’re using conjunctions we need to use the same

grammatical structure.

This same idea comes with lists.

When we have a sequence or a list in our writing we need to use the same grammatical structure throughout

the entire list.

So for an awkward example again we have the best students who work hard submit their work on time and

aren’t wasting their time on the weekends.

If you notice we’ve shifted again we’ve shifted the grammatical structure at after the last comma in

our sentence with the last item in our list the correct way to do this would be to keep it grammatically

or structurally the same.

The best students work hard submit their work on time and don’t waste time on the weekends.

OK so you see this is getting kind of repetitive but it’s to drill and this idea that parallel structure

simply means using the same grammatical structures and these different scenarios with coordinating conjunctions

correlative conjunctions and in your lists.

Finally we also need to use parallel structure in our clauses and our phrases so here rather than using

the same grammatical structure we need to use the same Colazal structure to show the relationship between

equal clauses.

So let’s begin again with an awkward example with the players dedication to each other.

And when the coach supports the players the soccer team could have a successful season.

So let’s revise this to make it correct with the players dedication to each other and with the coaches

support of the players the soccer team could have a successful season.

Another correct way of doing this would be when the players are dedicated to each other and when the

coach supports the players the soccer team could have a successful season.

Finally another correct version would be if the players are dedicated to each other and the coach supports

the players the soccer team could have a successful season.

So in the US the very first the awkward version has two different clauses structures we have with the

players and when the coach and the first correction we change them both to with the second correction

we’ve changed them both to win and then the third correction we’ve used if and eliminated the second

one.

So we just have if the players are dedicated and the coach supports all tied back to again here the

focus is that the Colazal structure remains the same just as before in order to create parallel structure

are grammatical structures need to remain the same.

We do this to add clarity and it is very important that you begin to adopt this strategy into your own

writing style and that’s it for today we’ll see you next time.