Combining sentences

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1. Thoko is fascinated by new places.
2. Thoko has applied for a job with a travel agency.

Where do we now begin? The first step is to find a verb or doing word, which will ‘glue’ the two sentences together. After identifying of the verb in the first line, the comma would separate the two sentences. You also have to be mindful of not repeating the noun or the pronoun appearing in both sentences.

A noun is a name of a person, object or place. A pronoun is a word which stands for a noun such as “she”. Let’s try. The verb is “fascinated.” So the combined sentence runs: Fascinated by new places, Thoko has applied for a job with a travel agency.

Have you seen the noun we have tried not to repeat? Well, I guess you have seen that the noun is Thoko.

I now invite you to challenge yourself to attempt merging the following sentences. Let’s try!

(a) The house has been completely renovated.

(b)The house should fetch a good price on the market.

Do you still remember how we have to go about it? The verb is “renovated”. So we may morph the two sentences into one as follows: Completely renovated, the house should catch a good price on the market.

Have you seen also how we avoided repetition of the noun which is “the house”?

Let’s now move to the second pair of sentences which we will call c and d.

(c)The child was disabled and abandoned.

(d)The child was unable to go to school.

In the instance of the two sentences above, we have to find the adjectives. An adjective is a part of speech which tells us more about a noun, thus it’s a word which tells us more about a person, place or object. In the sentences above, the adjectives are “disabled and abandoned” because they tell us more about the child. So the merged sentence should run as: Disabled and abandoned, the child was unable to go to school.

Let’s move to the next set of sentences.

(e) Ntate Nokwe is an expert on primary health care.

(f)Ntate Nokwe will lead the discussion on immunisation.

We have to work to identify the adjective or verb. But now it’s now a bit easy, isn’t it?

The phrase “an expert” contains the adjective; it is informing us more about Ntate Nokwe. So the sentences, merged, would assume the following form:

“An expert on primary health care, Ntate Nokwe will lead the discussion on immunisation”.
Should we try one more set of sentences before we call it quits?
(g) The young singer was intimidated by the crowd.
(h) The singer rushed through the song.

Let’s see how we can combine the above sentences. Let’s find the verb. The verb in this instance is “intimidated.” Let’s begin with the verb, and the combined sentence will run as follows: Intimidated by the huge crowd, the singer rushed through the song.

So here we are! With continued practice we will master how to combine sentences. We will learn to identify some pertinent parts of speech such as nouns, adjectives, verbs and adverbs and use them as the “glue” merging the two sentences. It can be done! Let’s meet again next week for yet another exciting lesson.

Vuso Mhlanga teaches at the University of Zimbabwe. For almost a decade and half he taught English language and Literature in English at high school. Send your comments and questions to: mhlangavuso85@gmail.com