What are Clauses?

Clauses are grammatical structures with a subject and a verb.

Example: She ran to the store because she was hungry.
Independent Clause: She ran to the store.
Dependent Clause: because she was hungry.

There are two types of clauses

Independent Clauses and Dependent Clauses

Independent Clauses

Independent clauses are structures that have both a subject and a verb and express a complete thought (they can stand alone).

Example: I ate food.
I (subject) ate (verb) food.

Dependent Clause

Dependent clauses are structures that have a subject and a verb but they do not express a complete idea. They add extra detail to a sentence.

There are three types of dependent clauses: essential, non-essential, and relative.

Dependent Clause

Essential clauses give information that is necessary to the idea or sentence. If you remove this information, the sentence will lose meaning.

Example: Jonathan who is from France told me all about the wonderful places to go in Europe.

If removed, you might ask: "Why take advice from Jonathan?"

Dependent Clause

Non-Essential clauses give information that is unnecessary to the idea or sentence. If you remove this information, the sentence can still stand alone

Example: Jonathan, who is from France, fell down a flight of stairs.

If kept, you might ask: "Why does it matter that he's from France?"

Dependent Clause

Relative clauses take the place of an adjective in a sentence. It answers the questions: "Which one?" or "What kind?"

Example: Jonathan bought a shirt that was blue.

The Elements of Style

In The Elements of Style, refer to pages 2-5, which state the book's Rule #3: Enclose parenthetic expressions between commas. In this section, you can see how essential and non-essential clauses can be placed into a sentence effectively.