Hence... HarryT your example is not grammatically wrong... "Hiking the trail" in the correct context is grammatically and linguistically correct...It may be incorrect for Grammarnistas but it is not incorrect linguistically... Thus my problem with anal retentive grammarians.... linguistically correct context trumps grammar everyday...as you said... the difference between a good chess player and a great chess player...
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Originally Posted by HarryT
Because we tend to speak in sentence fragments, not grammatically complete sentences, and dangling participles are essentially a written form of the type of "shortcut" that people use in the spoken language. It's perfectly understandable, even if grammatically wrong. The reason it's grammatically wrong, of course, is that the participle clause has no verb, but the verb is clearly implied - eg "Hiking the trail" is really "While I was hiking the trail".
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