When a Preposition is an Adverb

THE MYSTERIOUS PREPOSITION

I understand confusion about prepositions. They are strange words. Useful to be

sure, but hard to pin down. You cant define them in the normal way. Try it for
yourself: Whats the definition of with, of, from, on? Prepositions show relationship.
They show how a noun or pronoun is related to another word or word group in a
sentence.

Gabby stuck her gum under the table.

The project is due before Tuesday.
Juneau is the capital of Alaska.

Each of these simple sentences includes a preposition, which I have conveniently

underlined for you. Each of them show how a noun is related to something else in
the sentence. Under shows how the gum is related to the table in space. The
relationship indicated is spatial. Most prepositions are like this showing location
in space.

In the second sentence, before shows when the project is due in relation to
Tuesday. The relationship here is chronological time-oriented.

The last one is the trickiest. Fortunately, the vast majority of prepositions are like
the first two showing spatial or chronological relationship. Of is the oddball, but
it is a very common word. Of is always a preposition and shows a sort of basic
relationship that isnt necessarily related to time or space. If something
is of something, it is simply related to it in some way that makes sense to the
reader.

PREPOSITIONAL PHRASES

You cant understand prepositions without understanding prepositional phrases

because prepositions always form a prepositional phrase. Always. Thats important.

A prepositional phrase includes the preposition, its object, and any modifiers
related to the object. If you ask what? after the preposition, youll find its object.
For example, in our sample sentences above, ask under what? (the table) before
what? (Tuesday) and of what? (Alaska). Table, Tuesday, and Alaska are the objects
of their respective prepositions. The prepositional phrases, therefore, are
everything from the preposition to its object:

Gabby stuck her gum under the table .

The project is due before Tuesday .
Juneau is the capital of Alaska .
W H E N A D V E R B S LO O K L I K E P RE P O S I T I O N S

Now that youve got prepositions down, I can explain how its easy to confuse them
with adverbs. Many words can serve in either of these roles in a sentence. Heres
the easy way to tell which is which:

If it has an object, its a preposition, if it doesnt, its an adverb.

Example:

Billy ran up the stairs.

Billy looked up and saw the alien spacecraft.

Both sentences include the word up. We know up is often a preposition, but lets
check. Does it have an object? In the first sentence it does: stairs. Up what? Up the
stairs.

How about the second sentence? Up what? Theres no answer because theres no
object. Up in this example is being used as an adverb to modify the verb looked. It
shows how or where Billy looked.

Source: http://blog.writeathome.com/index.php/2012/12/when-a-preposition-is-an-
adverb/