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Are both the sentences expressing same thought?

The plan is environmentally disastrous.

                                  Vs

Environmentally, the plan is disastrous.

Mari-Lou A
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Sam
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    When you open the sentence with "Environmentally" in that manner, it is typically to place special emphasis on the word for some rhetorical purpose. "Environmentally the plan is disastrous, but it will greatly increase our profits." It can have a concessive "spin". – TimR on some device Dec 10 '23 at 13:05

2 Answers2

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Close enough that in most situations they are interchangeable.

Structurally the first has the adverb acting as a modifier of "disastrous", and the second has the adverb as an adjunct of the whole clause. With different words, these structures can have different meanings:

Pat was unfortunately dressed (their clothes were poorly chosen, they should have worn different clothes, not a very natural sentence)

Unfortunately, Pat was dressed. (They should have been naked)

But in your example, I can't see any real difference.

James K
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    I'd welcome edits for a better example than "unfortunately dressed" – James K Dec 10 '23 at 08:03
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    I'm not convinced about the second has the adverb as an adjunct of the whole clause. I think that would be the case if we changed initial *Environmentally* to, say, *Frankly, because then it would really be a "whole sentence adverb". But in the example as given that doesn't apply for semantic, not syntactic* reasons. It's just a stylised inversion, within which *environmentally* still applies to *the plan* regardless of where it's placed. Well, I suppose strictly speaking, the adverb always applies to the verb (is) anyway, but that's not very helpful. – FumbleFingers Dec 10 '23 at 12:40
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    Yes @FumbleFingers, but I'm going to put that in the box marked "let's not overthink this" There are questions here about whether an adverb modifies the adjective, or the verb or the whole clause, and, frankly, I often don't see any real difference in the meaning. That's the case here. – James K Dec 10 '23 at 12:50
  • @JamesK - I think it's fine, although I hope it wasn't cold where Katy was. – Michael Harvey Dec 10 '23 at 13:18
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    I think the example itself is fine, although I would consider changing Katie to a more gender-neutral name (eg Pat) to avoid the implication of male gaze. It might also bear pointing out that the two different meanings are reproduced in the structures "X was dressed unfortunately" and "X was dressed, unfortunately" – Kirt Dec 10 '23 at 17:48
  • I think there is a slight difference in emphasis between the two examples with "environmentally". The first to me suggests the plan is disastrous, and the way in which it is disastrous is environmental; whilst the latter says that the plan is disastrous in regards to the environment, but leaves open the possibility of it being disastrous in other areas too. The first sentence doesn't entirely rule them out, but it would certainly be stranger for the speaker to then complain about the plan's poor fiscal implications after the first sentence than it would after the second – Tristan Dec 11 '23 at 15:07
  • Note that the meaning of your first example would change to the second with the addition of commas: "X was, unfortunately, dressed". And when spoken, the difference can be subtle. – Barmar Dec 11 '23 at 17:07
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OP's first version is the "syntactic default" for English - the adverb (environmentally) goes next to the verb (is). The second version is a "stylistic inversion" with exactly the same meaning.

Note that structurally, that second version with the "fronted" adverb looks like a whole sentence adverb. For semantic reasons that classification doesn't apply with OP's example, but it certainly could with a different adverb...

1: The plan is truly disastrous
2: Truly, the plan is disastrous

....where unquestionably truly in #2 refers to the entire assertion that follows. This leads to a small but potentially significant semantic distinction that might be more obvious in, say...

3: I didn't know he truly liked you
(I thought perhaps he was just being politely friendly to you)
4: Truly, I didn't know he liked you
(I swear I had no idea he was even "favorably disposed" to you)

TL;DR: The actual examples as given just represent different stylistic choices with the same meaning, but there are structurally similar utterances where the position of the adverb more clearly affects the meaning.

FumbleFingers
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  • I wouldn’t use the term ‘stylistic inversion’ here – I think it risks being misunderstood. It’s a somewhat recondite term to begin with, even within linguistics; but more importantly, it’s ambiguous, being also used (more logically, one might argue) for cases where elements are switched around for purely stylistic reasons, like unusual word orders in poetry. For ELL purposes, I would just say it’s ‘fronted for emphasis’ or ‘topicalised’ – Janus Bahs Jacquet Dec 11 '23 at 02:56
  • I don't think of "stylistic inversion" as a "linguistics" term. To me it's a standard usage in the context of Lit Crit and the deconstruction of poetry, and the meaning should be relatively transparent. And I specifically didn't want to say something like "fronted for emphasis" because that's not always true - "fronting" as a subtype of "inversion" can be done for a range of reasons, not just emphasizing the term moved forward. If you think people will misunderstand me, all I can say is I'd rather use "stylistic inversion" than "hyperbaton" (meaningless, unless you already know the word). – FumbleFingers Dec 11 '23 at 03:11
  • ...actually, I wonder if you've understood me. I wasn't saying the "whole sentence adverb" usage is a stylised inversion (as in my *truly* examples, where the actual meaning changes). I only said that about the OP's second version, where the meaning doesn't change. And I'm not willing to say that fronting the word *environmentally* gives it "emphasis". That's a matter of opinion which I don't happen to share anyway! – FumbleFingers Dec 11 '23 at 03:18
  • I certainly didn’t think you were talking about sentential adverbs (a type of disjunct), since those don’t take part in inversion at all – they’re not moved to the front (or end) of the sentence, that’s their original location. But while I agree that fronting an element doesn’t change the basic meaning of the sentence, I strongly disagree that it doesn’t provide emphasis. Apart from ‘automatic’ fronting (essentially wh-fronting and subject–verb inversion in questions), the entire purpose of fronting is moving an element into focus position, which is a form of emphasising it. In this case → – Janus Bahs Jacquet Dec 11 '23 at 12:18
  • → placing the adverb at the head of the sentence creates an expectation of contrast in a way that placing it after the verb doesn’t. That is, with “The plan is environmentally disastrous”, we don’t expect anything more – the statement is complete. With “Environmentally, the plan is disastrous”, we are left expecting something to contrast with environmentally, such as, “[but] fiscally, it is the best option”. That expectation of contrast is due to the extra amount of emphasis placed on environmentally when fronted. – Janus Bahs Jacquet Dec 11 '23 at 12:21
  • As for ‘stylistic inversion’, it is a linguistic term for a specific type of fronting/inversion also known as ‘locative inversion’ – but it’s quite an obscure term. I’m not sufficiently-versed to know whether this particular case would fit in that category or not, but I thought that was the term you were using. The more general ‘stylistic inversion’ found in literature and poetry is a different, and much broader, concept. I suppose this could be seen as a stylistic form of inversion, but so is “Who will think of him upon the waters blue?” – the term is too broad to say much here. – Janus Bahs Jacquet Dec 11 '23 at 12:29
  • My degree included linguistics as a suboption, but until I saw your first comment above I had no idea that linguists seem to have appropriated what to me was a perfectly ordinary expression. But I don't care anyweay - I shall continue with my usage, because to me it's "accessible", whereas I've never had much time for truly obscure terminology like hyperbaton (many such terms were "invented" to make English fit the model of Latin or Ancient Greek). Whatever - thanks for all that background info and opinions, but I don't plan on changing the wording of my answer - I'm happy with it as is. – FumbleFingers Dec 11 '23 at 13:54