Grammar: Word classes: Adverbs

Expressing a personal viewpoint  Back

Form and function

So far, we have been looking at how the grammatical form of adverb can perform the function of 'expressing a personal viewpoint'. This function, however, can also be performed by various other grammatical forms such as adverb groups, noun groups, and others.

We need to remember that there is never a one-to-one relationship between form and function: one grammatical form might perform a number of different functions, and one particular function might be expressed by a range of grammatical forms, as in the following table:

Function Form
expressing a personal viewpoint (comment) adverb (Fortunately he left early.)
adverb group (Quite fortunately he left early.)
noun group (The fortunate thing was that he left early.)
'dummy it' clauses (It was fortunate that he left early.)

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