Lesson loading, please wait.

Ways We Use Parallelism

Parallel Words

First, let's look at how words may or may not be parallel:

 

The stop order requested that the contractor proceed only when the new materials were inspected, cleared, and to review for safety.

What part of the sentence above is not parallel?

 

The stop order requested that the contractor proceed only when the new materials were inspected, cleared, and to review for safety.

 

"To review" is not parallel with "inspected" and "cleared." The change here should be simple. Make sure "review" ends in the same way as inspected and cleared—with the suffix "ed."

 

Here is the revised sentence:

 

The stop order requested that the contractor proceed only when the new materials were inspected, cleared, and reviewed for safety.

 

 

Parallel Phrases 

Now let's look at how phrases and clauses may or may not be parallel:

 

The manager told his employees that they should stock the shelves, that they should clean the bathrooms, and to count the registers before closing time.

 

What part of the sentence above is not parallel?

 

The manager told his employees that they should stockthe shelves, that they should cleanthe bathrooms, and to count theregisters before closing time.

 

The phrase "to count the registers before closing time" is not balanced with the other clauses in the sentence. Remember, to achieve parallelism, words, phrases, and clauses should all begin and end the same way. The two preceding clauses begin with "that" followed by the subject "they" and a verb. Let's fix the sentence so it's parallel.

 

The manager told his employees that they should stock the shelves, that they should clean the bathrooms, and that they should count the registers before closing time.

 

Or, an even cleaner fix might be:

 

The manager told his employees to stock the shelves, to clean the bathrooms, and to count the registers before closing time.

 

The use of prepositional phrases can also contribute to a sentence's parallelism. A prepositional phrase begins with a preposition, such as "about" or "through" or "before," and ends with an object. Look at the sentence below and see if you can pick out the prepositional phrases:

 

I went to the house to look for my sweater.

 

"To the house" and "for my sweater" are both prepositional phrases.

 

Sometimes we use prepositional phrases in a list with single words; this generally causes a sentence to be out of balance.   Here is an example of a sentence that lacks parallelism because the prepositional phrase needs to be revised:

 

After school, they went swimming, driving, and to the mall.  

 

You could make this sentence parallel by changing the items in the list so that they are all structured the same way.

 

One revision: After school, they swam in the public pool, drove to the park, and went to the mall.

Second revision: After school, they went swimming, driving, and shopping.

  spacer

learning activity Click below the question to view the answer.
This content requires

JavaScript enabled.
 

 


Self Check Area

 

Now let's check your understanding of parallelism. Click on the "Self Check Quiz" wording below to begin.

 Open/Close Self Check Quiz

 

 

Click here to go to the review section for Module 2: Parallelism.


Click to close