Grammatical Exclusivity in English Communication Situations; the Case of Adjective “Only” Misplaced as Adverb

Abstract

There is a strong connection between syntactic structures and the meanings they generate in
the English language. A word’s syntactic environment determines its grammatical and
communicative name and function. Therefore, the word “only” can be an adjective or an
adverb, depending on what word it is placed near. The current survey investigated the extent
and frequency of misplacement of what is meant to be a focusing exclusive adjective “only”
in sentences as an adverb and its communicative consequences. A total of 51 instances of such
misplacement were obtained through accidental sampling. Syntactic-semantic analyses of 20
of them are presented. Also, the ability of 200 English speakers to identify the errors of
misplacement and their semantic disruption was tested. The findings show that the
misplacement defies racial boundaries and, strangely, results in no communication breakdown.