You have probably heard of nouns, verbs, and adjectives, but have you ever heard of an independent clause? No? Well then look no further because English Editorial Solutions has got your back.
While you might not think it important to know what an independent clause is, understanding them is vital to anyone seeking to write effectively. Whether constructing essays, emails, or articles, knowing how to identify and work with independent clauses will empower you to craft clear, structured, and coherent sentences, which, in turn, leads to more compelling, impactful, and easily comprehensible content.
So, let us get down to business. An independent clause is a grammatical term used to describe a group of words that contains a subject and a predicate and can stand alone as a complete sentence. In other words, an independent clause expresses a complete thought and does not require any additional information to make sense on its own.
For example, “I love to read books” is an independent clause because it contains a subject “I” and a predicate “love to read books” and can stand alone as a complete sentence. It expresses a complete thought and does not require any additional information to make sense.
In contrast, a dependent clause is a group of words that contains a subject and a predicate but cannot stand alone as a complete sentence. It requires additional information to make sense and is usually used in conjunction with an independent clause to form a complete sentence.
For example, “Because I love to read books” is a dependent clause because it contains a subject “I” and a predicate “love to read books” but cannot stand alone as a complete sentence. It requires additional information to make sense and is usually used in conjunction with an independent clause such as “I spend most of my free time reading books” to form a complete sentence.
And there you have it; it is that simple. Understanding the difference between independent and dependent clauses is important in constructing clear and grammatically correct sentences. Of course, we are standing by to assist with any of your editing or proofreading needs. So, feel free to get in touch with us, we would be happy to help.