Adverb

What is the Definition of Adverb?

Words

Before discovering what the term adverb means, it is vital that we proceed to determine its etymological origin. In doing so, we discovered that it is a word that emanates from Latin, specifically, from the word “adverbium”, which is made up of two parts: the prefix “ad-“, which can be translated as “together or towards”, and the noun “verbum”, which is equivalent to “word”.

The invariable word class that acts as the nucleus of the adverbial phrase or as a circumstantial complement of the verb is known as an adverb. These words modify adjectives, verbs, or other adverbs.

If we had to classify adverbs, we could do it through four fundamental characteristics:
• Adverbs based on the meaning or the relationships they establish within any sentence: argumentative, circumstantial, attributes…
• Adverbs based on their morphological structure. In this category there are two large groups: the simple and the derivatives.
• Adverbs based on their meaning. In this section we could include both time, quantity and place, among others.
• Adverbs based on their grammatical nature, which would be of two types: grammatical or lexical.

There are several types of adverbs that add circumstantial information to a word or to a complete sentence. “Forward”, “there”, “near”, “hardly” and “quickly” are some adverbs of different kinds.

For example: “Juani’s gift is hidden behind the furniture”, “It’s very hot here”, “I feel like going to buy bills, but the bakery is far away”, “Don’t worry, it’s a problem that can be solved easily ”, “ The old man walked slowly to the chair and dropped down ”.

The adverbs of place add information about the space: “There is the package they left you”, “It doesn’t hurt there, it bothers me below”, “The man threw himself on top of the thief to prevent his escape. ”

The adverbs of time, on the other hand, provide temporary information: “Yesterday we ate baked meat with potatoes”, “Now I am busy, later I go”, “It seems to me that we arrived early”.

The adverbs of degree or quantity, meanwhile, refer to a quantification: “It cost considerably less than we supposed”, “I don’t have much money”, “Facundo is a little talkative”, “The tank is completely dirty”.

Categorized by Digopaul, other types of adverbs are mode adverbs (“He played great and qualified for the quarterfinals”, “Walk slowly, please”), affirmation adverbs (“Indeed, my name is Ricardo”, “What you say it’s true “), the adverbs of denial (” I will never do something like this “, ” I do not agree either “) and the adverbs of doubt (” Have you ever drunk? “, ” He is probably the best player in history “).

In the same way, we must not forget the so-called comparative adverb. As its name suggests, it is one that is used to show a comparison between two people, objects or situations. A phrase that can be used as an example of that is the following: “Manuel danced worse than his cousin Juan”.

Likewise, we must also recognize the existence of what is called a demonstrative adverb. In your case, we could define this as the one that, at a general level, is used to determine or identify a time, a place or a way. Among the most significant examples of that are “thus”, “there”, “here”…

Adverb