adverbs
Here and there are adverbs.
What is the main verb here?
The main verb is also called the lexical verb or the principal verb. This term refers to the important verb in the sentence, the one that typically shows the action or state of being of the subject.
Is here a adjective?
As detailed above, ‘here’ can be a noun, an interjection, an adjective or an adverb. Noun usage: An Alzheimer patient’s here may in his mind be anywhere he called home in the time he presently re-lives. Adjective usage: John here is a rascal.
What are the types of main verb?
Those are the four types of main verbs: (1) action transitive, (2) action intransitive, (3) no‑action to be, and (4) no‑action linking. 5.
What are the examples of auxiliary verb?
Auxiliary verbs are: be, do, have, will, shall, would, should, can, could, may, might, must, ought, etc. I think I should study harder to master English. I am having a cup of coffee.
Can here be an adverb?
Alas, no. It’s still an adverb. The construction Here/There is/are Noun Phrase allows the adverb to be fronted, with the subject Noun Phrase moved to the end, as the new information.
What are all the regular verbs?
Regular verbs are those whose past tense and past participles are formed by adding a -d or an -ed to the end of the verb. Regular verbs list: arrange – arranged – arranged. arrive – arrived – arrived. ask – asked – asked. attack – attacked – attacked. bake – baked – baked. behave – behaved – behaved.
How to find adverbs?
An adverb is a word which modifies the meaning of a verb, an adjective, or another adverb. The easiest way to find adverbs is to look for the verb in a sentence , and then see if there is a word that describes how the action is being done. quickly.
Is observe a verb?
Definition of observe. transitive verb. 1 : to conform one’s action or practice to (something, such as a law, rite, or condition) : comply with failed to observe the law and as a consequence had to pay a fine. 2 : to inspect or take note of as an augury, omen, or presage observed the flight of the sacred geese.
The word “there” have multiple functions. In verbal and written English, the word can be used as an adverb, a pronoun, a noun, an interjection, or an adjective.
- Adverb
This word is classified as an adverb if it is used to modify a verb in the sentence. For example, in the sentence below:
They went there only to find out that it was postponed.
The word “there” is considered as an adverb because it describes the verb “went.”
Definition:
a. in or at that place
- Example:
- We went on to London and stayed there two weeks.
b. at that point or stage
- Example:
- Stop right there before you say something you’ll regret.
- Pronoun
Sometimes, the word “there” is categorized under pronouns, if it is used to replace a noun in the sentence. For instance, in the sample sentence below:
Hello there!
The word “there” is considered as a pronoun because it substitutes the name of the person, in this case, You.
Definition:
a. used as an indefinite substitute for a name
- Example:
- Hi there!
- Noun
There are also some cases wherein the word “there” is considered as a noun, which refers to a particular point or place. Take for example, the sentence below:
There is no there and no here in pure space.
The word “there” is used as a noun, which refers to a location.
Definition:
a. that place; that point
- Example:
- You take it from there.
- Interjection
Other times, the word “there” is categorized as an interjection, when it is used to exclaim or emphasize something. In the sample sentence below:
There, it’s finished!
The word “there” is used for emphasis or to draw attention to a particular thing.
Definition:
a. used to focus attention on something and express satisfaction or annoyance at it
- Example:
- There, I told you my parents wouldn’t mind!
- Adjective
In some cases, the word “there” is considered as an adjective when it is used to modify a noun or a pronoun, as seen in the sample sentence below:
She is there to answer any questions you might have.
The word “there” modifies the pronoun “she” and is therefore considered as an adjective.
Definition:
a. capable of being relied on for support or help
- Example:
He is always there for her.
b. used for emphasis, especially after a demonstrative pronoun or a noun modified by a demonstrative adjective
- Example:
- Those guys there can tell you.
The word there is a commonly used word that can be difficult to classify because of its various roles in a sentence. There can be used as an adverb, pronoun, adjective, and sometimes as an interjection. But in grammatical constructions like there is or there are, there is considered an expletive. This tiny word can create a lot of confusion because the context can be so varied.
Study the following guide to help you understand how to label and classify the various roles of the word there.
The chart can help, but also pay close attention to specific grammatical constructions when there is or there are start the sentence. In these contexts, the word there is classified as an expletive. An expletive is an “extra word” not grammatically related to the rest of the sentence. Mind you, starting a sentence with these constructions will lead to wordy sentence writing, and they’re usually too passive for most written compositions. This occurs because expletives are used to postpone the subject to build a little suspense for the reader. Authors like to use it like a bit of “seasoning” to keep readers tuned in. Here’s an example sentence demonstrating these structures:
There are explosives hidden under the railway bridge! (Delayed Subject — explosives)
vs.
Explosives are hidden under the railway bridge! (There is omitted to get to the point.)
You can tell the first example expresses more drama, right? Used sparingly, expletive constructions with there is or there are can be titillating. Just be careful!
Hint: If a sentence beginning with a there is or there are construction can be rewritten without the word there, you are working with the expletive form of the word.
In closing, there’s also the soothing phrase, “There, there…”, but we will save that for another time! Thanks for reading!
For those interested in a little info about this site: it’s a side project that I developed while working on Describing Words and Related Words. Both of those projects are based around words, but have much grander goals. I had an idea for a website that simply explains the word types of the words that you search for — just like a dictionary, but focussed on the part of speech of the words. And since I already had a lot of the infrastructure in place from the other two sites, I figured it wouldn’t be too much more work to get this up and running.
The dictionary is based on the amazing Wiktionary project by wikimedia. I initially started with WordNet, but then realised that it was missing many types of words/lemma (determiners, pronouns, abbreviations, and many more). This caused me to investigate the 1913 edition of Websters Dictionary — which is now in the public domain. However, after a day’s work wrangling it into a database I realised that there were far too many errors (especially with the part-of-speech tagging) for it to be viable for Word Type.
Finally, I went back to Wiktionary — which I already knew about, but had been avoiding because it’s not properly structured for parsing. That’s when I stumbled across the UBY project — an amazing project which needs more recognition. The researchers have parsed the whole of Wiktionary and other sources, and compiled everything into a single unified resource. I simply extracted the Wiktionary entries and threw them into this interface! So it took a little more work than expected, but I’m happy I kept at it after the first couple of blunders.
Special thanks to the contributors of the open-source code that was used in this project: the UBY project (mentioned above), @mongodb and express.js.
Currently, this is based on a version of wiktionary which is a few years old. I plan to update it to a newer version soon and that update should bring in a bunch of new word senses for many words (or more accurately, lemma).
Short answer
We will look at how this is used.
This sentence contains a subordinate clause
- how it was used
This is in fact an interrogative clause. And the word how here is an interrogative adverb.
Full answer:
Adjuncts
We often put extra information at the end of a clause explaining when, where,why or how something happened. These phrases that give us this extra information are Adjuncts. We call phrases that give us extra information about the way that something was done or the way that something happened manner adjuncts. Here are some examples:
- The elephants danced beautifully.
- They ate the donuts in a hurry.
- They did it like this.
Open Interrogative clauses
Open interrogative clauses have a wh- word at the beginning. They also have a gap in the rest of the clause which tells us what the wh- word refers to. Look at the following sentence:
- He punched him.
If we make an interrogative clause with this sentence, we need a gap for the clause to make sense:
- Tell me who [he punched him].
The interrogative clause above does not make sense because we do not know who the who- refers to. After we put in the gap, it becomes clear:
- Tell me who [ ___ punched him]
- Tell me who [ he punched ____ ]
We understand who in these sentences as having the same meaning as the missing part of the clause. So we could model those clauses like this:
- Tell me who (i) [ ____(i) punched him]
- Tell me who(i) [he punched ____(i)]
When we want to ask about the manner in which something is done, we can use an interrogative clause with how. When we do this there will be a gap at the end of the clause where the manner adjunct would be:
- They used it like this
- Tell me how [they used it
like this] - Tell me how(i) [they used it ____(i)]
The Original Poster’s question
We will look at how(i) [this is used _____(i) ].
In the sentence above, the word how is an interrogative word corresponding to the gap in the end of the interrogative clause where the Adjunct would normally be. Because we associate Adjuncts with adverbs, most grammars would regard how as an interrogative adverb here.
There are indeed sentences which use how as a subordinator. But in such sentences there is no gap in the clause after how. The subordinator how can always be replaced by the word that:
- I went to see my Dad and told him how I’d failed my exams and had to drop out of college.
The sentence above probably does not mean that I explained the manner in which I’d failed my exams and dropped out of college, but just the fact that I had. We can easily replace the word how with the word that here:
- I went to see my Dad and told him that I’d failed my exams and had to drop out of college.
Notice that if we try to do that with the Original Poster’s example, it becomes ungrammatical:
- *We will look at that this is used. (ungrammatical)
This shows that the word how is not a subordinator in the Original Poster’s sentence.