sentence adverb

English

Examples
Understandably, some of you are going to be very upset. Hopefully, there won't be more than a few dozen. [Such use of hopefully has been proscribed, but various modern usage guides state that that notion is dated and not practically useful anymore.]

Noun

sentence adverb (plural sentence adverbs)

1. (grammar) An adverb that modifies an entire clause or sentence rather than a single word or phrase.

   Hypernym: disjunct

   • 1985, Robert Burchfield, The English Language, Oxford: Oxford University Press, page 156:

     In every section of this invaluable work new light is thrown on ancient problems - phrasal verbs (bring up, put off), phrasal-prepositional verbs (catch up on, come up with) [...] duratives, sentence adverbs, and so on.

See also

• Category:English sentence adverbs