How Bad(ly) Do You Feel

THE STYLIST-PLAGUING usage feel badly continues apace. Is it really as 1 bad as its detractors say? Or can we accord it acceptability? In looking for a reasonable answer, we must take account of a number of factors. First of all, the use of adverb for adjective is not per se a vulgarism. The language has long seen healthy interplay between these word classes. The influences behind such interplay between bad and badly are various and are unlikely to be discouraged by routine proscription of the usage. Further, there are other factors which suggest that feel badly represents an independent development of an alternative adjective badly. Let us take up first the adverbial influences. It seems obvious that the actional uses of feel-to feel very strongly, feel very definitely-lend strong encouragement to feel badly. For instance, Mencken, in his American Language: Supplement II, apparently considers feel badly to be an active verb and adverb, since he speaks of feel badS as being similar to the use of real for really. In addition, the emphasis which has been put on the use of adjectival well in place of good with certain linking verbs (look well, feel well) has given unexpected impetus to the berated expression. To begin with, the dual nature of the predicative well makes it diicult to distinguish between particular adjectival and adverbial uses.l Then, even though grammatical rationalization often makes that well an adjective, the predominant association appears to be adverbial (the adjective well having derived 'from 7Ivell adv. in predicative use' [OED], it is not surprising), and the carry-over is natural. Maetzner, it should be noted, calls well an adverb in the type of use which is generally taught as adjective, citing: 'Are you well?' (Shakespeare); 'This may be well' (Milton); 'It could not but be well' (Tennyson)

Adjective · Adverb · Adverbial · Linguistics · Noun · Predicative expression · Verb · Lexicography and Language Studies · Psychology · Philosophy