Thanks, Bruce. You looked deeper for parallelism than I did, and I like
your rewrite.
Herb
________________________________
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Bruce Despain
Sent: Friday, January 19, 2007 9:05 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Grammar Question
Herb & Geoff,
I think the parallelism is between the two elements in the second
clause, the author probably thinking that the "its" needed to be given
to both elements. The same lack of parallelism could be said about the
"of the college" belonging to both conjoined elements in the preferred
version (C). My revision was identical to yours, but I didn't send it
in when I saw your reply. At risk of being overly pedantic, I offer the
following comments:
The basic propositions are:
1) She was president of the college for some time.
2) Many changes occurred during that time.
3) Those changes increased the educational quality of the college.
4) Those changes increased effectiveness.
I think that what might have been intended is:
4) Those changes increased the educational effectiveness of the college"
though this is still not fully informative. Nevertheless, I think that
to maintain strict parallelism these concepts would have to be retained
in parallel, so that we would have something like:
E) During the time that she was president of the college many changes
occurred which increased its educational strengths, in both quality and
effectiveness.
Bruce
>>> "Stahlke, Herbert F.W." <[log in to unmask]> 01/18/07 6:11 PM >>>
Geoff,
There are no passives in the first clause or any of the variants of the
second clause. The verbs have non-agentive subjects, but the clauses
are all active. However, I agree, as I posted earlier, that all three
alternatives are poor. And I'm not sure why parallelism is an issue in
this test question. A semicolon doesn't demand parallelism between the
two clauses it links; although that may be a good thing in some cases,
it's not clear that it is here.
Herb
>While "C" seems fine to me, I don't understand why "B" is deficient.
Actually, they're all deficient! As in most of these idiotic tests, the
real answer is "none of the above."
I suppose that "c" does provide a modicum of parallelism by creating a
prepositional phrase (the "effectiveness of what") that weakly parallels
"educational quality". However, the construction is still out of whack
(technical! term t here!). It would seem more effective to simplify the
sentence. In addition, although passive verbs are not automatically
wrong,
this one is certainly suspect. How about, "She improved the quality and
effectiveness of the college during her presidency."? This is still
much
too vague for my tastes, but it does solve a variety of the problems.
Geoff Layton
The correct answer is given as "C." My daughter's workbook
>notes that "B" is not parallel; however, I thought that in seeking to
>determine whether parallel structure exists in a sentence, one need not
pay
>attention to items that modify the elements that are equal in
placement,
>importance and/or function. Thus, regarding choice "B," I don't think
that
>it matters that "its educational" modifies "quality," but that
>"effectiveness" has no modifier. Thank you for your help.
>
>Many change! s occur red while she was president of the college, and
they
>increased its educational quality as well as effectiveness.
>
>A) college, and they increased its educational quality as well as
>effectiveness
>B) college; these changes increased its educational quality and
>effectiveness
>C) college; these changes increased both the educational quality and
>effectiveness of the college
>
>To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web
interface
>at:
> http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html
>and select "Join or leave the list"
>
>Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/
_________________________________________________________________
Get Hilary Duff's homepage with her photos, music, and more.
http://www.live.com/?addtemplate=hilary&ocid=T001MSN30A0701
<http://www.live.com/!%0d%0a%20?addtem%0d%0aplate=hilary&ocid=T001MSN30A
0701>
To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web
interface at:
http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html
and select "Join or leave the list"
Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/
To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web
interface at:
http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html
and select "Join or leave the list"
Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/
________________________________
NOTICE: This email message is for the sole use of the intended
recipient(s) and may contain confidential and privileged information.
Any unauthorized review, use, disclosure or distribution is prohibited.
If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender by
reply email and destroy all copies of the original message.
To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web
interface at: http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html and select
"Join or leave the list"
Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/
To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface at:
http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html
and select "Join or leave the list"
Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/
|
