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TechKillsUs Posted 18 years ago
Grammar

Reduced Adverbial Clauses

Can I reduce "While my father was watching TV, I did my homework" to "My father watching TV, I did my homework" ?
  

Top answer

I would avoid it, especially because there are two subjects (my father, I). CB

  • I would avoid it, especially because there are two subjects (my father, I).
  • CB
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10 Answers
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I would avoid it, especially because there are two subjects (my father, I).
CB
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Thank you Cool Breeze? But is it grammatically correct?
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TechKillsUs But is it grammatically correct?

Who knows! In my opinion it isn't but others might disagree. These structures, which I have always called 'clause equivalents,' are used in a myriad ways and opinions about their correctness vary greatly.
CB
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TechKillsUs"My father watching TV, I did my homework"
It doesn't sound natural. "While" shows the actions were concurrent but if for some reason you don't want to use it you could say: My father watched TV and I did my homework.
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In my opinion, it is grammatically correct, but it is not a conversational form.
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As Cool Breeze says opinions vary. Thank you Diamondrg and Huevos.
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TechKillsUsCan I reduce "While my father was watching TV, I did my homework" to "My father watching TV, I did my homework" ?

While my father was watching TV, I was doing my homework.
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Yoong Liat
TechKillsUsCan I reduce "While my father was watching TV, I did my homework" to "My father watching TV, I did my homework" ?

While my father was watching TV, I was doing my homework.

That isn't a clause equivalent. Nothing has been reduced. The continuous finite verb was doing
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Hi CB

I agree. I was thinking of parallel construction.
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TechKillsUs "My father watching TV, I did my homework"
I've learned here it's an error called "a comma splice." You cannot connect two independent sentences with a comma except for a conjunction.

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