What is the difference between phrases and subordinate clauses

Therefore they're not appositives. Thanks everyone for your relies.. But as a learner I have some problem here. How will I test that the noun clause can substitute a noun in this kind of sentences? So all I learned that it's more of a semantic issue than a grammar. In this sentence quote:. Their insistence was that the meetings should be held at lunch time. Their opinion was that the meetings should be held at lunch time.

That meetings should be held at lunch-time. Case 2 Noun clause in apposition is equivalent to preceding noun but cannot take its place in the sentence: - The fear that there may be an economic recession has caused a drop in investments. This is a semantic question.

Case 3 Noun clause in apposition is not equivalent to preceding noun and cannot take its place in the sentence. As I see it, this is called appositive because it is clearly not a relative clause, but at the same time is not such an evident example of apposition as cases 1 and 2.

I'd say it's more like a noun complementizer. That things should be done that way. This shows that noun and "apposition" are not equivalent. Hi David Thank you for jotting down the posts and compiling an answer.

And my sincere thanks to other people who have contributed to their valuable inputs as well. David, please don't mind but I still can't get the semantic difference in case of case number 2. How will I understand that? And again, in case of case 3 if the following is the method to judging if they are equivalent or not, I can't understand why they are not equivalent.

Study that. It's enough material in the above. David, your list is great! And so is their classification. I hadn't seen them. There are many hidden treasures in this forum.

Hello everyone. I read this thread from the beginning once again, and re-read it. Then closed everything and thought about this. And started to make sense Yes, the semantics differences are difficult to address. I think the following sentence which is marked wrong is true in that the that-clause "that he might lose his job" is not representing the "fear". They might be equivalent. Here are some sentences with appositive phrases:. When you need to describe more about the position of a noun or pronoun, you use a preposition.

A prepositional phrase includes all of the words that follow, which can include noun phrases. Check out these examples of prepositional phrases:. Participles are similar to gerunds in that they use verbs in a different way. Participial phrases typically begin with a participle verb used as an adjective and the modifiers that follow. Like adjectives, they modify nouns.

Even though they appear to contain both a noun and a verb, the verb is functioning as a participle, not an action word. Some examples of absolute phrases include:. Need more help with any of these phrases? You can read more examples of phrases here.

Clauses are the backbone of a sentence. They contain the subject and predicate that make a sentence complete. Independent clauses are complete sentences. You can combine two independent clauses in a compound sentence, or add a dependent clause to create a complex sentence.

Some examples of independent clauses include:. Dependent clauses are also known as subordinate clauses. While dependent clauses have subjects and verbs, they do not express a complete thought.

They need to connect to an independent clause with a coordinating conjunction or subordinating conjunction. Common types of dependent clauses are relative clauses , noun clauses , adjective clauses , and adverbial clauses.

Relative clauses begin with relative pronouns , and noun clauses function as either the subject or object of a sentence. Adjective clauses further describe the noun in a sentence and adverbial clauses modify the verb of the sentence. Understanding the difference between clauses and phrases is the first step to varying your sentence styles. To learn more about sentence types, read an article on compound sentences or complex sentences. All rights reserved.

The Main Difference Between Phrases and Clauses Phrases and clauses are both groups of two or more words that convey ideas. Types of Phrases Phrases include details that make a sentence more interesting. Noun Phrases A noun phrase, also known as a nominal , functions as a noun in a sentence. Examples of noun phrases include: The small yellow car belongs to my neighbor.

I bought a large Greek salad for lunch. November 11, What is a phrase? Words can be grouped together, but without a subject or a verb. This is called a phrase.

Phrases can be very short — or quite long. What is a clause? Your turn While clauses, phrases and sentences might seem very similar at first, on closer look you can start to see how they function very differently. Prev Next.