The landlord refused to respond to inquiries. Because he said he needed to talk to his lawyer. When told the phrase beginning with “Because” was a sentence fragment, the student objected: But you said ...

And, but and or are the three main coordinating conjunctions. They join two clauses which are grammatically independent of each other and would make sense if they stood alone. Compare the following: ...

SPEAKER 1: Sometimes in your writing, you need to link ideas. SPEAKER 2: Because they are related. SPEAKER 1: Good example. ‘Because’ is a conjunction. SPEAKER 2: Conjunctions are linking words.