Sentence modifiers

Adjectives describe or modify nouns or pronouns. They add information by describing people, places, or things in a sentence. These words, more than any others, make your essay a unique piece. You can use them to describe people, objects, and situations to make the reader understand your point of view and see things the way you have seen them. Too few adjectives will make a personal statement a boring play-by-play that doesn t tell the reader anything about the writer. 

Dangling participles and misplaced modifiers, though sometimes difficult to recognize, are easily fixed by rearranging your sentence. 

A dangling participle is a phrase or clause, using a verb ending in -ing that does not refer to the subject of the sentence it modifies. Since it is so critical that your reader understand your point easily and exactly, dangling modifiers (and indeed any ambiguous language) must be avoided. 

A misplaced modifier is a word or phrase that describes something, but is in the wrong place in the sentence. It isn t dangling no extra words are needed the modifier is just in the wrong place. The danger of misplaced modifiers, as with dangling modifiers, is that they confuse meaning. 

Did the cafeteria meet with student government To say exactly what is meant, the modifying phrase "meeting with student government" should be moved to the beginning of the sentence. 

Catholic Church). The sentence, however, was modified to one of perpetual imprisonment, and he was confined in the Castle of San Leo, where he died in 1795, after four years of imprisonment, in what manner is not known. 

Modifiers make your point clear while adding meaning and originality to your writing. Consider how powerful, specific adjectives and adverbs work in these sentences ... 

Wordiness and ambiguity often prevent ideas from coming across clearly. Edit your sentences to eliminate clutter and unnecessary repetition. Revise sentences that use overly informal or overused words, and exchange the passive voice for the active. Clarify ambiguous words and unclear pronoun references. Finally, improve your writing by using precise modifiers and adding variety to your sentence structure. 

Read the following sentences, all taken from the chemical literature but with most hyphens removed. Locate two- or three-word modifiers. Decide if they require hyphens. Add hyphens where necessary. If the sentence has no two- or three-word modifiers, write correct as is . 

Separate two or more adjectives with commas if each adjective modifies the noun equally. They are brave, studious students. Here you could replace the comma with the word and, and the sentence would make sense. This was a beautiful Persian carpet. (Here beautifuf modifies the Persian carpet.)... 

The best option will use words clearly. Watch for unclear modifying words or phrases such as the ones in the next group of sentences. Misplaced and dangling modifiers can be hard to spot because your brain tries to make sense of things as it reads. In the case of misplaced or dangling modifiers, you may make a logical connection that is not present in the words. 

Translation modified. In the original translation by Schilpp (1949), the word is was removed from two places in the first sentence to improve the parallelism and flow. 

Because adjectives and adverbs serve similar functions —they both modify or describe—they are often confused and therefore make good candidates for SAT questions. Remember that adjectives modify nouns or pronouns while adverbs modify verbs, adjectives, and other adverbs. Let s look at a simple sentence ... 

Since you know you re looking for adjective/ adverb errors, they should have been easy to find. In the first sentence, the adverb federally (note the -ly ending) is used to modify the noun tax, when the adjective federal is required. Sentence 2 also uses an adverb (violently) to describe a noun (scenes). In sentence 3, the verb armed is described using the adjective inadequate. Change the adjective to the adverb inadequately to correct the error. 

Choice b has a misplaced modifier—many people are not the fringe treatment. It is also wordy. The second clause in choice c is untrue. Choice d is unnecessarily wordy, and choice e is a sentence fragment. 

FORTRAN statements also can be inserted by the user in the paragraph called FORTRAN. Using the DEFINE sentence, as before, any problem variables may be accessed. Using FORTRAN language, any arbitrary transformation of the problem variables may be made and stored. This extremely flexible capability allows the user to (1) modify block calculations, (2) change stream values, (3) insert user FORTRAN blocks, and (4) execute many other powerful, specific functions. A BEFORE or AFTER statement can be used to make the FORTRAN execution before or after any block. 

As written, the sentence expresses that the chair has been shopping for five hours nonstop, instead of Megan. The modifier has to be moved so that it is modifying the correct noun. 

Once you get your first draff down, its time to start revising it. (11) You have to look for stuff like run-on sentences, misspelled words, and misplaced modifiers. (12) That s something I do all the time, so now I always watch out for that. (13) And you have to be sure that what you said makes sense. (14) That sthe main consideration, and not to be forgotten. 

Mercury Determine as directed in the monograph for Iron, Reduced, but use 2 g of sample and 40 mL of Sodium Citrate Solution in preparing the Sample Solution, and prepare the Diluted Standard Mercury Solution as follows Transfer 4.0 mL of Mercury Stock Solution into a 250-mL volumetric flask, dilute to volume with 1 A hydrochloric acid, and mix (1 mL = 4 xg Hg). Modify the first sentence of the Procedure to read Prepare a control by treating 1.0 mL of Diluted Standard Mercury Solution (4 pig Hg) in the same manner.. .. ... 

Modifiers made up of phrases or dependent clauses can be added to simple sentences to indicate, for example, cause and effect, or time sequence, or comparison. 

A restrictive phrase or clause is one that is essential to the meaning of the sentence. Restrictive modifiers are not set off by commas. 

A misplaced modifier is one that is placed next to the wrong word in the sentence, so it inadvertently misrepresents the author s intended meaning. 

A dangling modifier is one that lacks a word in the sentence to modify in a logical or sensible way. It should not be confused with an absolute construction, which modifies an entire sentence. (See also the discussion of dangling modifiers in Chapter 9.)... 

---