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  • - [Voiceover] Hello grammarians.

  • Alright, today I want to start talking about conjunctions,

  • and conjunctions are this part of speech that

  • has a very particular function in English and what it does

  • conjunctions unite words, phrases, and clauses.

  • Let me, let me show you an example.

  • So if you want to talk about two things,

  • you could say it's a peanut butter and jelly.

  • Or if I were going to paraphrase Eddie Izzard,

  • I might offer you the choice of cake or death.

  • You could also describe something as being sad but true.

  • And these three are the most commonly used conjunctions

  • because I would be remiss if I didn't mention the

  • seminal conjunction song that got me into

  • the grammar game in the first place, Conjunction Junction,

  • which I think was written by Jack Sheldon

  • or performed by Jack Sheldon in like, 1973.

  • Schoolhouse Rock. It's great. Look it up.

  • But what I'm going to talk about today

  • is a mnemonic, or a memory aide, called FANBOYS.

  • You may have heard this before, FANBOYS.

  • And this is how we remember the coordinating conjunctions.

  • And you don't need to worry about the name

  • coordinating conjunctions, we'll get to that later.

  • For now, just remember FANBOYS.

  • For, And, Nor, But, Or, Yet, and So. FANBOYS.

  • We'll go through how each one of these are used

  • over the next screen. Follow me downstairs!

  • So we've got For, And, Nor, But, Or, Yet, and So,

  • and each of them have a different basic function.

  • So let's, let's review them.

  • For has this connotation.

  • You can use it the way you'd use a word

  • like since or because, as in...

  • I do not eat buttons, for they are not food.

  • You can see I'm combining these two little sentences

  • using the word for.

  • We're using this for to explain my reasoning.

  • I do not eat buttons because they are not food,

  • and for is a simpler way to express that.

  • The conjunction and? Very elemental, very important

  • conjunction combines one thing with another as in...

  • The kangaroo robbed the bank and torched the saloon.

  • A rather criminal kangaroo.

  • And you can see we're using and to combine these two ideas.

  • We're saying, this thing happened, this thing also happened,

  • they happened together.

  • Nor is similar to and,

  • but we use it to combine untrue things.

  • We use it to express negation.

  • So if I were going to talk about an angry tree spirit,

  • for example, just to pull an example out of a hat,

  • I could say,

  • she won't leave her tree, nor will she speak with humans.

  • We use but to express exceptions, as in...

  • We used every building material but chewing gum.

  • Chewing gum is the exception to every building material.

  • We or as a conjunction to choose between options...

  • As in, would you rather have a pet bear

  • or a pet giraffe?

  • We ask the hard questions on Khan Academy.

  • Yet is kind of like but,

  • except that we use it to express unexpected things

  • so I'm just going to write, to the contrary!

  • As if I were Sherlock Holmes hollering at a confused Watson.

  • And to the contrary, my good man Watson!

  • This is how we use yet. I'll show you.

  • I want to leave, yet I cannot.

  • So it sets up this kind of push and pull

  • dynamic in a sentence, is what yet does.

  • We set the expectation, I want to leave,

  • and yet here's the unexpected, what I'd say an ironic part,

  • yet I cannot. I want to leave...

  • But unfortunately, or but unexpectedly.

  • When you would say but unexpectedly, just use yet.

  • And finally, the last part of FANBOYS,

  • so shows consequences.

  • Dougal was allergic to sheep,

  • so he skipped the wool festival.

  • Right so, so we're trying to set up that

  • as a consequence of the first clause,

  • Dougal being allergic to sheep,

  • the thing that follows is, because of that,

  • he decided to skip the wool festival.

  • This is FANBOYS, For, And, Nor, But, Or, Yet, So.

  • These are all covered in the exercises.

  • You can learn anything.

  • David out.

- [Voiceover] Hello grammarians.

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