Appositive Phrases

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Appositive Phrases

• Chawanna B. Chambers
• 4 October 2011

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Write a story about this picture.
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What are they?

• An appositive is a noun or noun phrase that
  renames another noun right beside it. The
  appositive can be a short or long combination of
  words.
• This technique is commonly found in the work of
  sophisticated writers.

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Why do we use them?
Sentence Variety
Keeps your writing from being boring!
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Where do we place them?

• Beginning (Sentence Openers)
• One of eleven brothers and sisters, Harriet was a
  moody, willful child.
• Langston Hughes, Road to Freedom
• Whom does the appositive rename?

Harriet
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Where do we place them?

• Middle (Subject-Verb Splits)
• A man, a weary old pensioner with a bald dirty
  head and a stained brown corduroy waistcoat,
  appeared at the door of a small gate lodge.
• Gordon Parks, My Mothers Dream for Me
• Whom does the appositive rename?

A man
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Where do we place them?

• End (Sentence Closers)
• The boy looked at them, big black ugly insects.
• Doris Lessing, African Stories
• Whom does the appositive rename?

Them
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Essential versus Optional

• Subject Verb Sentence
• Appositives are NOT essential parts of a
  sentence.
• If you remove the appositive from the sentence,
  what remains will still be a complete thought.

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Example 1

• It went away slowly, the feeling of
  disappointment that came sharply after the thrill
  that made his shoulders ache.

• It went away slowly, the feeling of
  disappointment that came sharply after the thrill
  that made his shoulders ache.

• It went away slowly.

Ernest Hemingway, Big Two-Hearted River Part I
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Example 2

• That night in the south upstairs chamber, a hot
  little room where a full-leafed chinaberry tree
  shut all the air from the single window, Emmett
  lay in a kind of trance.

• That night in the south upstairs chamber, a hot
  little room where a full-leafed chinaberry tree
  shut all the air from the single window, Emmett
  lay in a kind of trance.

• That night in the south upstairs chamber Emmett
  lay in a kind of trance.

Jessamyn West, A Time of Learning
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Stations

• Task
• Arrange the strips to create a complete sentence
  with the appositive properly punctuated.
• Write the sentence (grammatically correct) in
  your Notes section.
• Time
• 4 minutes per station

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Imitations

• Model Beside the fireplace old Doctor Winter
  sat, bearded and simple and benign, historian and
  physician to the town.
• --John Steinbeck, The Moon is Down
• Preposition article noun adjective noun verb,
  adjective conjunction adjective conjunction
  adjective, noun conjunction noun preposition
  article noun.

Revise a sentence in your story to match this
sentence structure. Be prepared to share.
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Works Cited

• Kamballur, Jimmy. Thiruvathira Dancer, India.
  National Geographic Magazine. Kerala, 2009.
• Killgallon, Don. Sentence Composing for High
  School. Portsmouth Boynton/Cook Publications,
  Inc., 1998.
• Simmons, Robin L. The Appositive. 2011. 4 October
  2011 lthttp//www.chompchomp.com/terms/appositive.h
  tmgt.