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I wonder if I can use however like in this sentence:

The lecture however does cover a lot of information, still doesn't explain the main subject.

Sounds a bit awkward to me, but it still seems that I've met something like this somewhere. What do you think?

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    Your example sentence is mainly ungrammatical because of what comes after the comma. But it would probably be improved by putting however after the word it's most likely to be modifying (in this case, probably does, not lecture). Nov 21, 2014 at 21:26
  • When it's used parenthetically (as in your specimen sentence), it improves comprehensibility to mark off however with a comma on either side: "The lecture, however, does cover ..." On another matter: there seems to be a 'but' missing: "... but still doesn't explain the main subject".
    – Erik Kowal
    Nov 21, 2014 at 21:35
  • @Erik: I don't know about you, but with no other context I'd be inclined to assume however modifies lecture with the word order as given. Which forces me to assume some slightly contrived context where the lecture is being given "faint praise" because at least it gives broad coverage (in contrast to something else previously mentioned, such as the preprinted notes, which didn't even manage to do that). Nov 21, 2014 at 22:26
  • Sorry I didn't clarify it right away. "However" was intended to modify the verb, and was not related to any context.
    – Vlad Sobol
    Nov 21, 2014 at 22:32
  • I think you want "although it" instead of "however".
    – TimR
    Nov 21, 2014 at 23:29

1 Answer 1

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"The lecture however does cover a lot of information, still doesn't explain the main subject."

You could say "The lecture, however, does cover a lot of information while still not explaining the main subject." if you're stuck on where however goes.

You could say "However, the lecture DOES cover a lot of information while still not explaining the main subject." or "The lecture DOES cover a lot of information; however it still doesn't explain the main subject" if you're stuck on using however and don't mind a semi-colon

I would probably say "While the lecture does contain a lot of information, it still doesn't explain the main subject." Hope this helps

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  • Those commas are not mandatory though. It works even without them.
    – Kris
    Nov 22, 2014 at 5:12
  • Which commas? There's s lot of them... you mean the first "...lecture, however,...", right? (Wow, that sentence was comma crazy; did I do it right? I have doubts inside the quotes. :) )
    – Ron Kyle
    Nov 22, 2014 at 15:34

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