Parts of a sentence are parallel when they share the same grammatical pattern. Parallelism is most often found within sentences at the level of the word, phrase, or clause, but sometimes parallelism can even extend across sentences, as in these three parallel sentences from Martin Luther King Jr.’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail”:

So I, along with several members of my staff, am here because I was invited here. I am here because I have organizational ties here. But more basically, I am in Birmingham because injustice is here. —Martin Luther King Jr.

Words

Those who failed were ceremonially accepted by other Indians and appropriately pitied by non-Indians. —Sherman Alexie

In this sentence, the words ceremonially accepted and appropriately pitied, both adverbial phrases, precede the preposition by; ceremonially accepted and appropriately pitied are parallel.

Because of this, the young man or woman writing today has forgotten the problems of the human heart in conflict with itself which alone can make good writing because only that is worth writing about, worth the agony and the sweat. —William Faulkner

In this sentence, the words agony and sweat, both nouns, follow worth; agony and sweat are parallel.

Phrases

[A]nd yes, I could say, yes, these white folks without the magnolia (who are indifferent to the tree’s existence), and these black folks without melons and superior racial patience, these are like the Southerners I know.—Alice Walker

To explain the Southerners she knows, Walker uses parallel prepositional phrases: without the magnolia and without melons and superior racial patience.

It was the Lord who knew of the impossibility every parent in that room faced: how to prepare the child for the day when the child would be despised and how to create in the child—by what means?—a stronger antidote to this poison than one had found for onself. —James Baldwin

In the preceding sentence, James Baldwin uses two parallel infinitive verbs each preceded by how: to prepare and to create.

Clauses

If the stakes ever became high enough—if the evil were evil enough, if the good were good enough—I would simply tap a secret reservoir of courage that had been accumulating inside me over the years. —Tim O’Brien

This sentence contains three parallel dependent, or subordinate, clauses; all begin with if. The repetition of enough is also part of parallelism.

I only needed to turn a corner into a dicey situation, or crowd some frightened, armed person in a foyer somewhere, or make an errant move after being pulled over by a policeman. —Brent Staples

The preceding example contains three parallel clauses: one independent and two dependent beginning with or.

I knew how to dress for school: at the Catholic school I attended we all wore uniforms; I knew how to dress for Sunday mass, and I knew what dresses to wear for parties at my relatives’ homes. —Judith Ortiz Cofer

This example begins with two independent clauses separated by a colon. The semicolon connects two more parallel constructions each beginning with I knew.

Lack of Parallelism

To fully appreciate the power of the parallelism in the preceding examples, consider what happens when supposedly equal elements of a sentence do not follow the same grammatical or syntactical form—that is, when they are not parallel with each other.

I only needed to turn a corner into a dicey situation, or crowding some frightened, armed person in a foyer somewhere, or making an errant move after being pulled over by a policeman.

This version of the Staples sentence that we looked at earlier moves from an independent clause to two dependent clauses that use verbals rather than simple verbs. The three phrases are not parallel, and as a result, the sentence lacks clarity and force.

Parallelism can be tricky when the elements—words, phrases, or clauses—are separated by modifiers or other syntactical elements. The following sentence may not at first glance seem to lack parallelism:

…I quickly left my mother and the children to the care of those impressive women, who, in Negro communities at least, automatically appear at times of bereavement armed with lotions, proverbs, and patience, and can cook.

When you analyze carefully, you notice that lotions, proverbs, and patience are nouns, and can cook is a verb. Notice that in the actual sentence that James Baldwin wrote in “Notes of a Native Son,” he makes all four words parallel nouns:

…I quickly left my mother and the children to the care of those impressive women, who, in Negro communities at least, automatically appear at times of bereavement armed with lotions, proverbs, and patience, and an ability to cook. —James Baldwin

The fact that all four are nouns underscores the gifts that these women bring to a grieving home—the lotions, sayings, kindness, and cooking are all of equal weight.

Parallelism is often at its most effective at the level of the clause, but again, it may be difficult to keep track. Let’s use an example from Malcolm Gladwell. Here it is without parallel structure:

In other words, Facebook activism succeeds not by motivating people to make a real sacrifice but when people are motivated to do things even though they are not motivated enough to make a real sacrifice.

That sentence makes sense—once you’ve untangled all the motivations!—but the emphasis Gladwell intends is on the not: people are not motivated by x but by y. In the sentence that actually appears in his essay, he repeats the phrase by motivating and thus uses parallel structure to emphasize the contrast:

In other words, Facebook activism succeeds not by motivating people to make a real sacrifice but by motivating them to do the things that people do when they are not motivated enough to make a real sacrifice.—Malcolm Gladwell

Rhetorical and Stylistic Strategy

Looking first at the parallel sentences at the beginning of this lesson and then at the rewrites that lack parallelism, you can see that writers use parallelism to emphasize, contrast, or connect ideas.

Following are the names, definitions, and examples of specific types of parallelism:

anaphora Repetition of a word or phrase at the beginning of successive phrases, clauses, or lines.

In this example, form follows function. Just as King is saying that African Americans have had to endure unjust treatment as they waited for full civil rights, this series of parallel clauses makes the reader wait—and wait—for the main point in the independent clause.

antimetabole Repetition of words in reverse order.

The example above from President Kennedy is, perhaps, his most famous quote. Part of what makes it so “quotable” is that the repetition inherent in antimetabole makes it dramatic and easy to remember. Because the pattern of the two clauses is so similar, the listener only needs to remember one pattern. Because that sentence pattern is repeated, it gives the listener two chances to understand the entire sentence and places extra emphasis on the second part. It is almost as if Kennedy is repeating a point for emphasis. Keep an eye out for antimetabole in modern political sound bites.

antithesis Opposition, or contrast, of ideas or words in a parallel construction.

In all three of these examples, the parallel structure creates a clear comparison between two things in order to emphasize the difference between them. Given by the oppressor is contrasted in meaning and in placement with demanded by the oppressed. Notice also how the parallel prepositional phrases by the oppressor and by the oppressed call attention to the tension between oppressor and oppressed.

zeugma Use of two different words in a grammatically similar way that produces different, often incongruous, meanings.

In the example by Downes, the zeugma is created in the description of the qualities of Flannery O’Connor’s South, from the expected “know their places” and “mind their manners” to the surprising “do horrible things to one another.” There is a consistency in the pattern, but an inconsistency in the effect of the phrases. Downes exploits the ironic inconsistency of the zeugma to show the ways that O’Connor surprises her readers with the way she portrays the rural South.