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Historians organize the past, and they can never do so with absolute neutrality.

Homegrown corn is incredibly sweet, and it is very difficult to grow.

If you ponder these sentences, you may begin to detect the danger of the word and. It does not specify a precise logical relationship between the things it connects but instead simply adds them. Notice that the sentences get more precise if we substitute but for and.

Historians organize the past, but they can never do so with absolute neutrality.

Homegrown corn is incredibly sweet, but it is very difficult to grow.

These sentences are still coordinate in structure; they are still the sentence type known as compound. But they achieve more emphasis than the and versions. In both cases, the but clause carries more weight, because but always introduces information that qualifies or contradicts what precedes it.

Emphasis Rests at the End of Coordinate Clauses

In both the and and but examples of coordinate clauses, the second clause tends to be stressed. The reason is simple: the end is usually a position of emphasis. You can see the effect of clause order more starkly if we reverse the clauses in our examples.

Historians are never absolutely neutral, but they organize the past.

Homegrown corn is very difficult to grow, but it is incredibly sweet.

Note how the meanings have changed in these versions because emphasis tends to fall on whatever comes last in a sentence. Rather than simply having their objectivity undermined (“Historians are never absolutely neutral”), historians are now credited with at least providing organization (“they organize the past”). Similarly, whereas the previous version of the sentence about corn was likely to dissuade gardeners from trying to grow it (“it is very difficult to grow”), the new sentence is more likely to lure them to nurture corn (“it is incredibly sweet”).

Nonetheless, all of these sentences are examples of coordination because the clauses are grammatically equal. As you revise, notice when you use coordinate syntax, and think about whether you really intend to give the ideas equal weight. Consider as well whether reversing the order of clauses will more accurately convey your desired emphasis to your readers.

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Try This 18.3: Rearrange Coordinate Clauses for Emphasis

Rearrange the parts of the following coordinate sentence, which is composed of four sections, separated by commas. Construct at least three versions, and jot down how the meaning changes in each version.

I asked her to marry me, two years ago, in a shop on Tremont Street, late in the fall.

Then subject two sentences of your own, perhaps taken from your papers, to the same treatment. Make sure to describe how the meaning changes in each case, because it will get you accustomed to seeing the effects of the rearrangements.

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Using Subordination to Adjust Emphasis

In sentences that contain subordination, there are two “levels” of grammar—the main clause and the subordinate clause—that create two levels of meaning. When you put something in a main clause, you emphasize its significance. When you put something in a subordinate clause, you make it less important than what is in the main clause.

As noted in the discussion of complex sentences, a subordinate clause is linked to a main clause by words known as subordinating conjunctions. Here is a list of the most common ones: after, although, as, as if, as long as, because, before, if, rather than, since, than, that, though, unless, until, when, where, whether, and while. All of these words define something in relation to something else:

If you study hard, you will continue to do well.

You will continue to do well, if you study hard.

In both of these examples, if subordinates “you study hard” to “you will continue to do well,” regardless of whether the if clause comes first or last in the sentence.

How the End Affects Emphasis When Using Subordinate Clauses

Unlike the situation