Sorry if this has been asked before. Wasn’t exactly sure how to search for it.
I’ve noticed something that’s been happening more and more often lately, and I wanted to ask if this is correct. Let me give an example. There is a radio commercial that runs pretty often here, and it’s the voice over guy supposedly talking to an insurance agent and they mention how they can tailor policies, blah, blah, blah. They mention people who smoke vs. people of medication, and the “insurance agent” says, “I just did a policy for someone who is 46 years old, smokes, and is on medication for diabetes. Most insurance companies would price that different.”
Shouldn’t that be “differently,” or am I mistaken here? I’ve also heard people do this with the word “serious.” As in, “You’d better take me serious.” I’d think that should be “seriously.” It doesn’t sound right, but I’m not exactly sure if it’s grammatically correct.
The OED says “different” as an adverb (“I told him *different”) is “Now only in uneducated use.” That’s a close to incorrect that you’re going to get these days.
The OED also indicates that “serious” is never an adverb. “You’d better take me *serious” is incorrect.
None of the examples in the posts above sound wrong to me and, in this post, “from words entire” just sounds a little old-fashioned to me. Maybe this is more common in the South?
Your other attempts don’t work because they’re not words with “ly”. Changing “really” to “real” doesn’t work in this example but I can really (heh) say why. It does work in the following:
Well, yeah, I knew you meant it as a joke but I thought it was interesting to figure out why your other mondifications don’t sound right at all. Maybe some wordy Doper will step in and explain the function of “really” in your sentence and how it differs from the other examples.
The OED says that “real” can be used as an adverb, though it’s colloquial and generally not used in the UK (but is close to standard in the US). In those contexts, it’s interchangeable with “really.” Technically, in some uses, it’s an adjective modifying a phrase: “real (good movie),” but the difference splits hairs so that the meaning “(real good) movie” modifies the adjective.
I liked that one myself! The two real adverbs didn’t seem entirely wrong, although the entire in “from words entire” could be confused with an adjective modifying the word “words” rather than the verb “omit”.
I noticed this years ago when Americans began using “real” as an adverb. Unfortunately it’s now starting to catch on here; but that doesn’t make it right.
The adjective-as-an-adverb usage seems to be particularly prevalent with American sports announcers. I’ve explained to my children (who have started watching football with me) that while it’s acceptable in U.S. English, it isn’t in the Canadian dialect. Of course, they’re also Americans, so I guess they can always use that as an excuse…
