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Hans51 Posted 11 years ago
Grammar
'act funny' or 'act funnily'
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They acted unreasonably when they turned down Jill's application.
He's been acting strangely ever since his Mom died.
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When he's angry, he acts the fool.
That guy is acting crazy.
Adjectives and adverbs follow the word act and depending on which speech part, it is sightly different and then in 'act funny', the speech part of funny is an adjective or adverb?
I think that it is used as an adverb because act should mean behave or the word means pretend in the sentence? What do you native English speakers think? Thank you so much as usual in advance!
behave
[intransitive always + adverb/preposition] to behave in a particular way:They acted unreasonably when they turned down Jill's application.
He's been acting strangely ever since his Mom died.
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pretend
[intransitive and transitive] to pretend to have feelings, qualities etc that are different from your true ones:When he's angry, he acts the fool.
That guy is acting crazy.
Adjectives and adverbs follow the word act and depending on which speech part, it is sightly different and then in 'act funny', the speech part of funny is an adjective or adverb?
I think that it is used as an adverb because act should mean behave or the word means pretend in the sentence? What do you native English speakers think? Thank you so much as usual in advance!
Top answer
The following is current US usage. The adj. is "funny," the adv.
- The following is current US usage.
- The adj.
- is "funny," the adv.
- is "funnily," but the adv.
- "funnily" is never used today.
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2 Answers
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The following is current US usage.
The adj. is "funny," the adv. is "funnily," but the adv. "funnily" is never used today. "Funny" is used as an adv., but only when the meaning is "strangely" or "oddly": "He's acting funny (strangely, oddly - not amusingly)." In the sense of amusingly, "funny" is not used as an adv. (the adv. form of the adj. "funny," in the sense of humorous, is not u
The adj. is "funny," the adv. is "funnily," but the adv. "funnily" is never used today. "Funny" is used as an adv., but only when the meaning is "strangely" or "oddly": "He's acting funny (strangely, oddly - not amusingly)." In the sense of amusingly, "funny" is not used as an adv. (the adv. form of the adj. "funny," in the sense of humorous, is not u
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Hans511. [intransitive always + adverb/preposition] to behave in a particular wayA predicative AdjP (He’s been acting strange) is also possible as a somewhat less formal alternative.
Hans512. to pretend to have feelings, qualities etc that are different from your true onesThis sense selects AdjPs but n
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