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1 名無しさん 1969-12-31T17:00:00
>nihongo to eigo
What if I made a thread about English? English is a fun language too.
I do hope to not drown out the Japanese threads though.
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2 名無しさん 1969-12-31T17:00:00
I've been able to read english for almost a decade and I still don't know where to place adverbs.
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3 名無しさん 1969-12-31T17:00:00
>>2
Just about anywhere.
He silently crept through the bushes.
He crept silently through the bushes.
He crept through the bushes silently.
Silently, he crept through the bushes.
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4 名無しさん 1969-12-31T17:00:00
>>3
Well, not just anywhere. Consider the following, which all vary significantly in meaning:
>Only professional coaches say that high salaries motivate players.

>Professional coaches say only that high salaries motivate players.

>Professional coaches say that only high salaries motivate players.

>Professional coaches say that high salaries only motivate players.

>Professional coaches say that high salaries motivate only players.

When an adverb modifies the whole sentence, the placement can be quite flexible. Other times, when an adverb modifies only one word, one must not only place it beside the verb being modified, but also avoid "squinting" modifiers. For example.:
>The high school's football star being recruited actively believed each successive offer would be better.

In this case, it is unclear whether the adverb "actively" is modifying "recruited" or "believed."

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5 名無しさん 1969-12-31T17:00:00
>>4
I think it's quite obvious it modifies ``believed''. I wonder, would most native English speakers agree with me?
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6 名無しさん 1969-12-31T17:00:00
>>4
You're right about the "only" example, but in my example "silently" only modifies "crept," not the whole sentence. I'm actually not sure how an adverb can modify a whole sentence, can you give an example?

>The high school's football star being recruited actively believed each successive offer would be better.

This sentence is grammatically incorrect. Both of your intended meanings can be expressed without changing the order:
>The high school's football star, being recruited, actively believed each successive offer would be better.

>>The high school's football star, being recruited actively, believed each successive offer would be better.


>>5
As a native English speaker, I would say that the sentence should be completely rewritten :)
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7 名無しさん 1969-12-31T17:00:00
>>6
Sorry about that, got a little mixed up. What I meant was closer to: if the sentence is simple and there is only one verb to worry about modifying, the placement is flexible. When the sentence contains more than one verb, then placement becomes more important. And, of course, it can still affect the meaning of the sentence.
>I'm actually not sure how an adverb can modify a whole sentence, can you give an example?

"Therefore, he ran across the road." Here, "therefore" does not modify "ran" directly, but rather the whole sentence.
>This sentence is grammatically incorrect. Both of your intended meanings can be expressed without changing the order:

I might be misunderstanding you, but I did mean for it to be incorrect in order to prove a point. Also, if I'm not mistaken, setting "being recruited" apart from the sentence like that changes it into a participle phrase, which then modifies the sentence as a whole.
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8 名無しさん 1969-12-31T17:00:00
I love all the fricatives and glides in english. sh, th, l, s, z. When you take real notice of it it sounds cool and pretty. unvocalized th is one of the nicest sounds in human language.
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9 名無しさん 1969-12-31T17:00:00
>>8
I'm an English native speaker and I never hear th. It always sounds like f to me.
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10 名無しさん 1969-12-31T17:00:00
>>9
I don't know how. Where do you live?
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11 名無しさん 1969-12-31T17:00:00
>>10
I think it's because my mother is foreign, or maybe because I'm incapable of something. However, I'm not alone. Many dialects of English have trouble with th.
>Where do you live?

Florida, but I believe it's not relevant.
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12 名無しさん 1969-12-31T17:00:00
>>11
I'd always known 'not prounouncing th' as mainly something black pepole do. The black american accent does come from the southern accent though, so itd make sense if it was common in florida.
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13 名無しさん 1969-12-31T17:00:00
>>12
>I'd always known 'not prounouncing th' as mainly something black pepole do

I've heard of this phenomenon too.
>common in florida

It's not. Also, south Florida, unlike north Florida, is culturally and linguistically not part of the south.
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14 名無しさん 1969-12-31T17:00:00
>>9
Some english people say "free"(three) and "fanks"(thanks) but that's all I've heard so far
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15 名無しさん 1969-12-31T17:00:00
>>14
Precisely.

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