Parallel Structure
By: Justin Lan
Rules
1. Parallelism is used to stabilize nouns with nouns, prepositional phrases with prepositional phrases, infinitives and infinitives, and clauses and clauses.
You must make certain that each element appears in the exact same grammatical form, and each element performs the same grammatical function.
In traditional grammar, failure to express such items in similar grammatical form is called faulty parallelism.
Examples of Right/Wrong
Correct: My uncle likes to eat in expensive restaurants and to visit museums.
Correct: My uncle likes eating in expensive restaurants and visiting museums.
Faulty: My friends never judged me by my words or what I did
Correct: My friends never judged me by my words or my actions.
Correct: My friends never judged me by what I said or (by) what I did.
Faulty: The tribes emphasized collective survival, mutual aid, and being responsible for one another.
Correct: The tribes emphasized collective survival, mutual aid, and responsibility for one another.
Faulty: The frustrated customer wanted to exchange the article, to obtain a refund, or she wanted to speak to the manager.
Correct: The frustrated customer wanted to exchange the article, to obtain a refund, or to speak to the manager.
Correct: The frustrated customer wanted to exchange the article, obtain a refund, or speak to the manager.
Faulty: I like swimming better than to dive.
Correct: I like swimming better than diving.
Correct: I like to swim better than to dive.
Test Yourself!
Answer each question with Faulty or Correct.
1. My dad likes to walk in the morning, and visiting the park.
2. Girish likes to drink water, and pantsing boys.
3. He loves playing tag, and watching football.
4. I hate reading in the dark, and carrying my books.
5. Ashley likes to ski, to swim and jumping
6. Joe likes swimming, walking and diving.
7. Tim was considered a very good employee because he was never late, he was very motivated and he was not lacking in initiative.
8. Mary wanted to make sure that she made her presentation creatively, effectively and persuasively.
9. In your bedroom, you can find the following: a bed, a closet, and sitting at the desk.
10. People who get ahead do lots of different things such as: studying, working hard and to attend college.