WRITING LESSON: DEPENDENT VS. INDEPENDENT CLAUSE

A clause is just a group of words with a subject and a verb, a part of a sentence. Some groups of words can get by on their own without any help: these are called independent. Others can't stand alone; either they don't have their own subject and verb, or they're subordinated to another part of the sentence: these are dependent. (A hint: dependent clauses often begin with words like if, whether, since, and so on; see Conjunctions.) Knowing the difference can help you figure out when to use commas.

For example: in the sentence "Since we've fallen a week behind, we'll skip the second paper," the first part — "Since we've fallen a week behind" — is dependent, because it can't be a sentence on its own. The second part — "We'll skip the second paper" — does just fine on its own; it's an independent clause. The independent clause can be a sentence without any help from the Since clause.