Mike Hannay en J. Lachlan Mackenzie - Effective Writing in English

1 Preliminaries

Op de persconferentie zei Dirksen: ‘De onderhandelingen zullen doorgaan tot we een oplossing hebben bereikt’. Wat hun wettelijke status betreft: ze blijven illegaal. De toekomst van Afrika wordt bedreigd door een verwoestende ziekte: AIDS. The corresponding English sentences show either no punctuation at all, as in the first two examples, or lighter punctuation, with a comma: This will mean paying more attention to tigers’ chances of survival. At the press conference Dirksen said ‘The negotiations will continue until we have reached a solution’. As far as their status in law is concerned, they remain illegal. The future of Africa is being threatened by a devastating disease, AIDS. Other differences relate to how parts of sentences (clauses) can be combined (see Chapter 6 for more detail). When you speak English or Dutch, you may run one clause into the next one without any real break, especially where the second one gives a motivation for the first:

“John came in late he didn’t get to bed until three you see.”

When it comes to writing English, the relationship between the two clauses may be specified by a linking word like because :

Germany has a strong commitment to the European Union because it has been a member since the early days.

Alternatively, the relationship can be left implicit, in which case the first clause must either end with a semicolon or be converted to a full sentence, with its own full stop: Germany has a strong commitment to the European Union; it has been a member since the early days. Germany has a strong commitment to the European Union. It has been a member since the early days. Many inexperienced Dutch writers link the clauses with a comma. This so-called ‘comma splice’ (see Chapter 9 Section 3.5) is found in some Dutch writing but is unacceptable in written English:  Germany has a strong commitment to the European Union, it was a member from the early days.

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