Adverbs and oil

We are still incredibly dependent on oil.

Two things are of interest in this sentence. The first, of course, is the content, which most of us will have to agree is correct. As most of us still rely on some form of transport other than our own two feet, we're using too much oil.

The second item of interest is the word "incredibly", which we can translate as "unglaublich". However, if you wanted to translate the sentence "Das ist unglaublich", you could not use "incredibly". Instead you would have to use "incredible".

We use the adverb "incredibly" to describe an adjective (as in "incredibly dependent" or "incredibly expensive") or as a sentence adverb (as in "Incredibly, the oil prices have gone up again"), whereas "incredible" is an adjective (as in "That's incredible" or "She's incredible").

We've created an exercise on adverbs about the topic of oil prices, and recent developments in the US in the oil industry.

Deborah Capras