Conjunction

From UniLang Wiki

A connective or connecting word; an indeclinable word which serves to join together sentences, clauses of a sentence, or words; as, and, but, if.

Def. from Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)

A conjunction can be coordinating, subordinating or correlative, according to the nature of the join constituted.

Contents 1 Coordinating 2 Subordinating 3 Correlative 4 Translations

Coordinating

Examples: and, or, for, but

Coordinating conjunctions join independent, syntactically equivalent elements.

• Independent clauses
  • I will play the music and the guests can dance.
  • You may sing but I will not listen.
  • I will not listen but you may sing.
  • Independent clauses can stand by themselves as sentences. The following has essentially the same content as the above, but the flow of language is broken.
    • I will play the music. The guests can dance.
    • You may sing. I will not listen.
• Independent words
  • He will play piano or accordeon.
    linking two independent direct objects.
  • I was singing and dancing.
    linking two verbs to constitute a predicate.

Subordinating

Examples: After, because, if, when

A subordinating conjunction introduces a dependent clause, and defines a dependency to another clause. The dependent clause always starts with the subordinating conjunction. The simplest form is with one independent and one dependent clause:

• You will be paid when the job is done.
• When the job is done, you will be paid.
• After the music ended, the audience called for encores.

Correlative

Examples: Either ... or, neither ... nor, both ... and

The distinction between coordinating and correlative conjunctions is somewhat elusive. A correlative conjunction is a word pair: a coordinating conjunction acting as a join, and an adjective or adverb defining a relationship in the join.

Consider the distinction between the following:

• He will play piano or accordion.
• He will play either piano or accordion.

The former sentence simply states that there is a choice. The latter emphasises that selecting one excludes the other.

Translations

Swedish: konjunktion, junktion c (in general); konjunktion c (coordinating); subjunktion c (subordinating)
Dutch: voegwoord n ; nevenschikkend (coordinating); onderschikkend (subordinating)

---

back to general grammar