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commas
with... |
Non-Restrictive
Elements
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By
"non-restrictive
element" I mean items such as transitional words, direct address,
appositives,
or others that you could take out and not change a
sentence's meaning.
You're
probably
already familiar with such elements, sometimes called "non-essential"
elements.
Again, for our purposes, an "NRE" is any element
that is unessential
to the basic meaning of the sentence.
What
you probably
haven't realized before is that non-restrictive elements are a lot like
introductory
elements--they add extra information--but they come in the middle or at
the
end of a sentence rather than at the beginning. Also like
introductory
elements, they can be a single word, like a transition.
The
problem with the furniture, however, is that it's
on fire.
Here
the word however acts
as a non-restrictive element. The term "non-restrictive" refers to
elements
that do not "restrict" the meaning of the sentence. More specifically,
they
generally do not change the meaning of the subject:
The
poem, written in some language I couldn't understand, made me want to
throw
my book away.
As
with introductory elements,
the trick to recognizing non-restrictive elements is to find the
sentence's main idea. In this case, it's
The
poem... made me want to throw my book away.
"Written
in a language I couldn't
understand" is a non-restrictive element because it
merely gives us
more information without "restricting" the meaning of the sentence's
subject,
"poem."
Q. How
can I tell whethen element is restrictive or non-restrictive?
A.
Good question.
Here's an opportunity to see how commas can be used to help your reader
understand
your meaning. Restrictive elements, as you've
probably guessed by
now, restrict the meaning of a sentence. Consider
how the presence
of commas can change the meaning of a sentence.
Lonely
people who don't shower often have few friends.
Ask
yourself about the meaning
of this sentence. As the sentence is punctuated now, which
lonely people
have few friends?
The
ones who don't shower. The clause isn't set off with commas;
that means
it restricts the meaning of "lonely people" to ONLY those who don't
shower.
Now
see what happens
if commas are placed around the clause. What does this sentence mean?
Which
lonely people have few friends?
Lonely
people,
who don't shower, often have few friends.
This
sentence proclaims that ALL lonely people have few
friends (it also implies that none
of them showers, a grim thought indeed). In other words,
placing commas
around the clause "who don't shower" makes it non-restrictive.
That means it doesn't restrict the meaning of the subject, "lonely
people."
The fact that they don't shower is just extra information.
Here's
another example:
Presidents,
who
drive drunk, should never be re-elected.
Which
presidents does this sentence
say should never be re-elected? All of them. The
commas mean that
the clause "who drive drunk" is non-essential information and that it
does
not restrict your re-election policy.
Again,
if we remove
the commas, we restrict the meaning of "Presidents" to ONLY those who
drive
drunk.
Presidents
who
drive drunk should never be re-elected.
Intro, Get Started, IE, CE,
2IC, FANBOYS,
CA, NRE,
Review
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