Subordinate Conjunctions

Subordinate Conjunctions

My mother fed the cat because it was incessantly meowing.

My mother fed the cat.

Can be a sentence. It has a verb and a subject and makes sense.

Open Ended

"Because it was meowing incessantly" is not a sentence. Why does a cat meow? And what happened because it was meowing??

A sentence is...

a group of words including a verb which make sense.

"Because it was meowing"

does include a verb however, does not make sense.

A sentence can also be called a (main/independent) clause.

However, a subordinate clause cannot also be called a sentence.

Subordinate Clauses

begin with subordinate conjunctions.

Subordinate Clause = Dependent Clause

"My mother fed the cat because it was meowing incessantly"

...consists of a main clause and a subordinate clause joined by a subordinate conjunction. This makes it a complex sentence.

Subordinating/dependent conjunctions:

when where while which whenever whether although if that as who as than unless because until once after since before though