Hi.  I'm writing to get some feedback about the function of the word
"whereas" and the oft-printed list of coordinating conjunctions.

Background.  In my technical writing classes, I give 10 minute editing
quizzes to encourage students to think about style and presentation.   A
question came up the other day when we discussed the following sentence:

One benefit of running is that the number of red blood cells are increased,
thus more oxygen can be carried per quart of blood.

I used the sentence to illustrate two errors:  a subject-verb agreement
("number .  . . is" not "number. . . are") and a sentence boundary error
("thus" serving as a conjunctive adverb, which requires a semicolon before
it).

Students didn't argue about the first, but some wanted to argue that "thus"
was not a conjunctive adverb; it functioned as a coordinating conjunction,
requiring a comma, not a semicolon.

In discussing this question with a colleague, we concluded that "thus" was
indeed a conjunctive adverb.  As we continued the discussion, we began to
wonder about coordinating conjunctions and the mnemonic BOYS FAN (But,
Or,Yet, For, And, Nor, So).  We wondered where (or whether) words like
"thus" and "whereas" fit.  "Whereas" caused us the most problem.

In a sentence similar to the one I used--

In the first case we have blah-blah, whereas in the second case we have
yak-yak.

we debated the function of "whereas."  Is it a coordinating conjunction?
Or would it function as "thus" did in the example I used?  [we're leaning
toward the former]

Any thoughts or help on this question?

Jim


Jim Dubinsky
Assistant Professor
English Department
Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University
Blacksburg, VA 24061-0112

http://athena.english.vt.edu/~dubinsky
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