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Easy way to find the subject of the sentence?

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Easy way to find the subject of the sentence?

by awesomeusername » Tue Feb 03, 2009 1:50 pm
I have recently cracked open the MGMAT SC guide and quickly found that I was having an issue finding the subject of the sentence. For example:

"She knows that despite the element of luck, the judgment and wisdom displayed by each contestant evidently affect the outcome."

How do you know that "judgment and wisdom" is the subject?
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by dimonya » Tue Feb 03, 2009 2:29 pm
i concur
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by avonmore » Tue Feb 03, 2009 5:03 pm
what is your mean?
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by dimonya » Tue Feb 03, 2009 8:48 pm
oh , you can detect subject of the sentence by the verbs.

verb= action , action applies to subject

so see what the verbs point to
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Re: Easy way to find the subject of the sentence?

by piyush_nitt » Wed Feb 04, 2009 3:23 am
awesomeusername wrote:I have recently cracked open the MGMAT SC guide and quickly found that I was having an issue finding the subject of the sentence. For example:

"She knows that despite the element of luck, the judgment and wisdom displayed by each contestant evidently affect the outcome."

How do you know that "judgment and wisdom" is the subject?
I think She is the subject and Knows is the verb.

anyone pls ?
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by awesomeusername » Wed Feb 04, 2009 10:36 am
OA says "judgment and wisdom" is the subject and "affect" is the verb.
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by hitmewithgmat » Wed Feb 04, 2009 2:26 pm
"She knows that despite the element of luck, the judgment and wisdom displayed by each contestant evidently affect the outcome."


You know that the sentence above actually contains 2 sentences. You can simply tell when you see the comma(,) mark between the sentence.

So, first sentence.
"She" is the singular subject.
"knows" is the verb corresponding to "she"

second sentence
"the judgment and wisdom" are the plural subject because the usage of "and". For example, A and B are friends. When connecting by "and", then you can safely tell that that sentence starts with plural subject. I hope this clear the doubt. moving on to the verb...

the verb in this second sentence is ........
Affect.

"displayed by each contestant" modifies the preceding nouns, "the judgment and wisdom"


p.s: the subject is almost always the first word to begin with.
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by iamcste » Thu Feb 05, 2009 5:16 am
awesomeusername wrote:OA says "judgment and wisdom" is the subject and "affect" is the verb.

OA would explain only the underlined part with errors

As explained by one of the poster, 2 sentences with individual subject and verb

She Knows---One pair

Judgement and wisdom , affect -other pair

so, you can have more than one subject-verb pairs but the focus should be on the portion which is underlined
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Re: Easy way to find the subject of the sentence?

by piyush_nitt » Thu Feb 05, 2009 12:59 pm
awesomeusername wrote:I have recently cracked open the MGMAT SC guide and quickly found that I was having an issue finding the subject of the sentence. For example:

"She knows that despite the element of luck, the judgment and wisdom displayed by each contestant evidently affect the outcome."

How do you know that "judgment and wisdom" is the subject?
Do you guys think that sentence is an example of Comma splice ?
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by Karen » Thu Feb 05, 2009 1:07 pm
This isn't an example of comma splice. Comma splice is when you slam two *independent* clauses together with nothing more than a comma:

She knows the answer, she doesn't want to say it.
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by piyush_nitt » Thu Feb 05, 2009 1:11 pm
Karen wrote:This isn't an example of comma splice. Comma splice is when you slam two *independent* clauses together with nothing more than a comma:

She knows the answer, she doesn't want to say it.
Karen,

Thanks for response.

IMO we have two independent clauses in the sentence.

She knows that despite the element of luck

She - Subject
Knows - verb

the judgment and wisdom displayed by each contestant evidently affect the outcome

the judgment and wisdom - Subject
affect - verb

Please let me know your thoughts!

Thanks heaps !
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by Karen » Thu Feb 05, 2009 1:25 pm
The first clause -- "She knows..." -- is actually dependent, in the sense that if you took the other clause out, it wouldn't be able to stand alone as a complete sentence. You'd just have "She knows."

It's also called the "main clause," and when you have a main clause and then another clause that is the object of a verb in the main clause, that's *not* a comma splice.
Karen van Hoek, PhD
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