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Fire1 Posted 6 years ago
Grammar

Can "that" be omitted in informal writing?

A. I'm so easily distracted I have sometimes forgotten what word I was going to write halfway through writing it.

I just came across sentence A on a website, but it looks like "that" is omitted between "distracted" and "I".

So I guess the full sentence is "I'm so easily distracted that I have sometimes forgotten what word I was going to write halfway through writing it".

If "that" can be omitted in informal writing in the case of "so..that", can "that" also be omitted informally in the case of "enough...that"?

B. I don't go jogging often enough that I would buy a pair of dedicated jogging shoes"

In sentence B, can "that" be omitted informally as in "I don't go jogging often enough I would buy a pair of dedicated jogging shoes"?

And even if that is omitted from B, could native speakers get the meaning of B easily?

  

Top answer

Grammatically, your sentence A. is fine. The subordinator "that" is optional, though it is more likely to be omitted in informal style than in formal style.

— BillJ

  • Grammatically, your sentence A.
  • is fine.
  • The subordinator "that" is optional, though it is more likely to be omitted in informal style than in formal style.
  • It's not a matter of a 'full' sentence vs a reduced one, but of a that -declarative content clause vs a 'bare' declarative one.
  • The content clause is complement of "distracted", but it is licensed (specifically permitted or required) by the "so" that modifies "easily", and hence may be called an indirect complement.
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1 Answers
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Grammatically, your sentence A. is fine. The subordinator "that" is optional, though it is more likely to be omitted in informal style than in formal style. It's not a matter of a 'full' sentence vs a reduced one, but of a that-declarative content clause vs a 'bare' declarative one.

The content clause is complement of "distracted", but it is licensed (specifically permitted or re

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