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Week 1 Parallelism

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23 views

Week 1 Parallelism

Uploaded by

innocentsyed960
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Prepared By: Maryam

Mushtaq
Functional English
HU-114
Parallelism In English
What is parallelism in writing?
Parallelism in writing occurs when
you repeat the same grammatical
form in multiple parts of a sentence.
Also known as parallel structure or
parallel construction, using
parallelism may help you avoid
grammatically incorrect sentences.
Writers commonly use parallelism
when there is a pair or a series of
elements, or in the headlines or
outlines of a document.
For example, to use parallelism in a
sentence in which you list a series of
elements, each element typically has
the same form. If your first two
elements are verbs, the third element
is usually a verb, too. Whenever you
list items in a sentence, you can put
them in the same grammatical form to
adhere to parallel structure.
Example of parallelism
Here is an example of a sentence that does not
use a parallel structure:
I enjoy reading, writing and to watch TV.
In this sentence, there are three elements in a list.
The first two elements (reading and writing) are
verbs that are in the present participle form, while
the third element (to watch TV) uses the infinitive
form, which contains the basic form and a
preposition. Here is that same sentence using a
parallel structure:
I enjoy reading, writing and watching TV.
By changing the third element to the present
participle, the sentence now has parallel
construction.
Benefits of parallelism
There are two major benefits to using
parallelism. The first benefit is that it can
help documents sound more pleasing and
feel complete. With parallelism, your
sentences sound like they have a rhythm.

The second benefit is that parallelism can be


more economical. This means that the author
can achieve multiple goals with fewer words. For
example, in the sentence, After waking up late, I
quickly ate, dressed and rushed out the door to
catch the bus, the author describes the
sequence of events using verbs in parallel
USES OF PARALLELISM
Words
When you have a series of elements
of equal importance, you can
implement parallelism at the word
level. You typically find these series of
elements separated by a comma or
semicolon within a sentence. To use a
parallel structure with individual
words, group nouns with other nouns,
adjectives with adjectives and verbs
with verbs.Example: I am looking for
a new car that is fast, affordable and
Phrases
You may also have a series of
phrases in a sentence organized
like a list The same concept applies
to phrases, meaning that you use
noun phrases with other noun
phrases and verb phrases with
other verb phrases. When using a
series of verbs, the verb phrases
use the same verb form, like
this:Example: Some of my
interests include hiking in the
Clauses
A clause is a group of words that contain
both a subject and a predicate. A
sentence must contain at least one
clause, but it may contain multiple. When
you have multiple clauses within a single
sentence, use parallel structure to
improve the readability. Here’s an
example:Example: My performance
review stated that I regularly show up to
work on time, that I work well with others
and that I communicate well with
customers.
Lists after a colon
To introduce a list of items after a
complete sentence, use a colon. A
colon typically takes the place of
introductory words such as for
example. Lists after a colon use
parallel structure for clarity and
readability, like this
example:Example: Our company
increased hiring for several key
reasons: demand in the industry,
substantial profit over the past year
Outlines and headings
If you are writing a paper, article or
some other document that uses
headings, use parallel structure in
those headings. This also applies
when creating an outline for such a
document. Since you want to use
parallelism with lists, think of your
headings as a list of items your
document covers. Here’s an
example:1. Project description2.
Timeline3. Goals4. Team members
THANK
YOU

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