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Sentence Fragments
Need a brief
review of parts of speech? It might help you to understand sentences better.
A sentence fragment is an incomplete sentence. A sentence in English is not
complete if it doesn't have both a subject and a finite verb.
Often a fragment is a piece of information that properly belongs to the sentence
just preceding it.
Wrong: A judge has to be fair and impartial.
Even to the point of seeming cold.
This is a sentence fragment. If we cross out the prepositional phrases,
we end up with "even," an adverb. Even to the point of seeming cold.
There is no subject and no verb.
How can we fix this? Easy! Simply join the fragment to the sentence preceding
it:
Right: A judge has to be fair and impartial,
even to the point of seeming cold.
Fragments are often dependent clauses that have been punctuated as a complete
sentence. (Dependent clauses are covered in the Review section.)
Wrong: The boy ran down the hill. Screaming
with laughter all the way.
Right: The boy ran down the hill, screaming
with laughter all the way.
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