In his ear, he whispers gaily.
Is "in his ear" a prepositional or an adverbial phrase?
Please explain your choice and give some reasons for your answer. Thanks!
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1Try including the sentence that caused you confusion. A phrase by itself, not in a sentence, can be prepositional, adverbial, or even other things. In English grammar, nearly everything depends strongly on context.– Ben KovitzJan 12, 2016 at 13:13
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4Didn't you just ask this same question earlier today? ell.stackexchange.com/questions/78549/…– stangdonJan 12, 2016 at 14:23
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@stangdon I think this should remain, but the first sentence of the original question should be deleted to split the question.– Nihilist_FrostJan 12, 2016 at 17:18
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1Please do not closevote as a duplicate: this question was part of an earlier question, but has now been extracted from it and no longer duplicates.– StoneyB on hiatusJan 12, 2016 at 18:17
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1 Answer
It is both.
The term preposition phrase describes the phrase's internal structure: it is constructed with a preposition followed by its object.
The term adverbial phrase describes the phrase's external syntactic role: it designates the place where the action was directed and is taken to "modify" the action in the same way as an adverb like softly or angrily would.
answered Jan 12, 2016 at 13:54
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@Araucaria I agree with your characterization of adverbial, but I am dubious about "worth mentioning": OP appears to be under the eye of a traditionalist pedagogue, and it may be indiscreet to proselytize. Jan 12, 2016 at 23:15
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Yes, indeed that was more for your amusement really, if I'm honest. Will delete in a bit. Jan 12, 2016 at 23:17