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Linking ideas in academic writing

Explore the grammar behind linking ideas in your academic writing including: prepositional phrases, conjunctions, clauses & adverbial phrases.
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7.7
There are different ways in which you can link ideas in your writing, but you need to understand the grammar behind them. These three sentences all have the same meaning. They all include two ideas which are linked in different ways. What is the grammatical difference in the ways they are linked? The linking word or phrase is underlined in each sentence.
37.2
“because of” is a preposition, or prepositional phrase, and we use prepositions before noun phrases. Other prepositions or prepositional phrases include; “With”, “From”, “Such as”, “Due to”, “Despite”, “According to”.
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“because” is a conjunction, and we use conjunctions to join clauses. Each clause must include a subject and a verb. Other conjunctions include; “And”, “Or”, “But”,and “While”.
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“As a result” is an adverb or adverbial phrase.
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Notice that here we use it to join ideas in two separate sentences.
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Other adverbs or adverbial phrases include; “However”, “On the other hand”, “Moreover”, “In contrast”, and “Similarly”. These adverbs or adverbial phrases are often used at the beginning of sentences, but notice that they can sometimes be placed in other positions. Some words “Such as”, “Before”, “After” and “Until” can be a preposition or a conjunction depending on the context.

You can use different methods to link ideas in your academic writing but it’s essential to understand the grammar behind them.

In this video Jonathan compares three sentences that have the same meaning. They all include two ideas, linked in different ways. Explore the underpinning grammar and how we use prepositional phrases, conjunctions, clauses and adverbial phrases in different ways.

You can view the examples from the video in this PDF document.

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An Intermediate Guide to Writing in English for University Study
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An Intermediate Guide to Writing in English for University Study

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