Welcome to tenth Grammar Guide!  This week we are going to be talking all about FANBOYS! 

Well, Myr & Cia are working together to talk about conjunctions, but FANBOYS are part of it.  We'll get to that shortly.

Conjunctions join two parts of a sentence together, and there are four types of conjunctions:

Coordinating Conjunctions

Coordinating Conjunctions - a conjunction placed between words, phrases, clauses, or sentences of equal rank. There are 7 of them and you can remember them with the mnemonic FANBOYS. When a conjunction joins two independent clauses, it must be preceded by a comma. 

Ex: I bought lettuce and carrots.

Ex: I bought the lettuce, but she bought the carrots.  

Correlative Conjunctions

Correlative Conjunctions - pairs of words that work together to connect two parts of a sentence that hold an equal value or correlate with one another. Some examples: either/or, neither/nor, such/that, both/and, as/as, whether/or, rather/than

Ex: I ate neither the lettuce nor the carrots.

Subordinating Conjunctions

Subordinating Conjunctions - Join an independent or main clause and a dependent clause together, usually to modify the independent clause to provide a reason, result, cause, or purpose. When a sentence starts with a subordinating conjunction, the entire phrase is followed by a comma. The most common words used in subordinating conjunctions, which can be remembered with the acronym I SAW A WABUB are: If, Since, As, When, Although, While, After, Because, Until, Before.

Ex: Since you are up, you can eat the lettuce.

Conjunctive Adverbs

Conjunctive Adverbs join two independent clauses in one sentence to show cause/effect, sequence of events, contrast, or connection. They are preceded with a semicolon and followed by a comma. There are common adverbs used for this purpose such as: however, therefore, nevertheless, besides, after all, finally

Ex: Lettuce is healthy for you; however, it is not something I enjoy eating.

• References:
  • Kern, Jara. (2020). The Infographic Guide to Grammar. Adams Media
  • Venolia, Jan. (2001). Write Right! (4th ed.). Ten Speed Press