An announcement: I have changed the name of my blog. I don't particularly care for that term, "blog", but there it is - BLOG (it's in the dictionary, look it up). Really, who came up with this term? And how did he or she do it?? Ahhh, yes, it must have been a teenage 'texter' ('texter': not in the dictionary - or at least not in the one I have and I do believe that Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary is the absolute authority of what new words we are to include in the English language).
At any rate, I reviewed my second of three posts (this being the third) and noticed that it wasn't formatted properly and had spelling errors. As for being grammatically correct, I wouldn't have a clue. (I think I missed that school year because, honestly, other than nouns, adjectives and adverbs, I certainly would have remembered the part about the dangling participle.) That, and I was probably about three Beams to the floor when I wrote it.
So there it is, revisited and revised.
What the hell is a 'dangling participle' anyway?? Please, no pictures - it's hard enough to read the dictionary these days without further damage.
All you need are nouns, verbs, modifiers and prepositions. Everything else is just a variant. And sometimes words and phrases will kind of be two things at once.
ReplyDeleteLike a participle. It's a kind of verb phrase which also acts as a modifier, like an adjective or adverb.
"Walking down the street, I ran across an old friend."
The phrase, "walking down the street," modifies the pronoun "I."
When it's not clear what the participle is modifying, we say that it is a "dangling participle," and then break into a giggling fit.
"Walking down the street, the building came into view."
Really? There's a building walking down the street? Probably not. What the sentence should probably say is:
"Walking down the street, I saw the building come into view."
Hey! You asked!
Good luck with the -- web site on which you will frequently leave posts. (I really hate the word "blog" too.)
You lost me in the first paragraph. Heh heh.
ReplyDeleteAntything "dangling" would bring attention to it, as well as much snickering. (I mean in literature, of course.)
Since I 'skipped' grade 3, I always assumed that was the year one was taught the basics of grammar. To my recollection, even in the english classes I took in later years, there was no review or furtherence of grammar teachings. I think (and hope) I generally get most of it right.
Thanks for the lesson (I think).