The Twenty Most Common Errors
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The reader does not need the clause who was the president of the club to know the basic meaning of the sentence: who was the first to speak. As a restrictive (or nonessential) element, the clause is set off by commas.
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The reader does not need the clause which had not met for 175 years to understand which assembly the sentence is talking about because the Estates General has already been named. This clause is not essential to the basic meaning of the sentence and should be set off by a comma.
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The reader knows which doll is Kristin's favorite -- her first one; Malibu Barbie is thus not essential to the meaning of the sentence and needs to be set off by commas.
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A nonrestrictive element is one that is not essential to the basic meaning of the sentence. You could remove it from the sentence and the sentence would still make sense. Check your draft to be certain you've used commas to set off any part of a sentence that tells more about a word in the sentence but that your reader does not need in order to understand the word or sentence.
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