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Speaker 1: I've been working hard recently. It's not that this is

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hard work. It's just that I have a hard schedule.

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Like today, I hardly had time to eat lunch. Sometimes

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I just wish I had an assistant, but it can

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be hard to find exactly the right person to hire.

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Speaker 2: Welcome to another Happy English podcast, coming to you from

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New York City. And here's your English teacher, Michael.

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Speaker 1: All right, thank you, John, and thanks everyone. It's Michael

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here from Happy English and I help people speak English better.

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This is Happy English Podcast, Episode seven eighty three. Is

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it hard or hardly? Hard or hardly? That's a good question,

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isn't it? A lot of English learners to tell me

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that these two words can be confusing, and they're right.

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They are, and that's because hard and hardly don't follow

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the usual grammar rule. Let me explain what I mean.

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You've probably learned that an adjective describes a noun, right,

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Like Jenny is a quick runner. Quick is an adjective,

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and it describes the noun runner. She's a quick runner.

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And like many adjectives, quick has a related adverb form,

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which is quickly. Just add l y to the adjective

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and it becomes an adverb, quick becomes quickly, and when

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you do that, the meaning is basically the same. So

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I can say Jenny is a quick runner, or Jenny

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runs quickly. Quick and quickly have the same meaning, like

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Hannah is a beautiful dancer or Hannah dances beautifully. And

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you know Jack right, Jack is a slow worker. He

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works slowly, easy, peasy, right, Like I said. Many adjectives

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work this way. That is, except for our focus today,

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which is hard. You see, the word hard can be

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used as both an adjective and an adverb, but the

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meanings of hard as an adjective and the meaning of

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hard as an adverb are different. And then we have hardly,

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which is also an adverb. So it goes hard, hard

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and hardly. Let's dive in. As an adjective, hard has

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basically two meanings. First, hard means solid or firm or

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not soft, like I made a loaf of bread, but

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it got hard because I forgot to put it in

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a plastic bag. The pillow is soft, but the mattress

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is hard. And then hard as an adjective also means difficult,

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like it was a hard exam, but I was able

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to get a good score because I studied, and I

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know from studying Japanese that learning a second language can

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be hard sometimes, So the adjective hard means firm and difficult.

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But we can also use hard as an adverb, and

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when we do, hard means with a great deal of

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effort or strongly. And as an adverb, hard comes after

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the verb. That's a key point, like it was raining

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hard all afternoon, and my friend Nick works hard every

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day in his office. By the way, if you study hard,

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you'll be able to speak English well. Again, as an adverb,

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hard comes after the verb, and that brings us to

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the adverb hardly, which has a totally different meaning. The

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adverb hardly means almost not or barely, and the adverb

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hardly comes before the verb. Like Jack hardly worked at

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all today. That's no surprise. He hardly worked. That means

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he barely did anything in the office. Anna has the flu,

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so she hardly ate anything all day. She hardly ate

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This means she practically didn't eat. Let's check out two

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more examples with the adverbs hard and hardly. Joe works hard.

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I think Joe would be a good coworker to have,

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don't you. He works hard. But then we have Jack

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oh Man. That guy hardly works it all in the office.

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He hardly works. I don't think I would want a

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coworker like him, would you? So there you have it,

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the basic difference between hard and hardly. Keep in mind

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the best way to remember vocabulary like this and any

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other word or phrase in English is to take that

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word or phrase, write it in a sentence that's true

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for you or true in your world, and then memorize

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your sentences. Did you know You can get more practice

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using your English when you join my podcast Learners study group.

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There you can make new friends, join us for live

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group lessons every week where we practice these podcast lessons together.

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Plus you get access to the pdf, transcript and audio

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download for every Happy English podcast in the past and

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in the future. And on top of that, each episode

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has exercises where you can practice this English point with

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speaking and writing checked by me. To learn more, just

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visit Myhappy English dot com and choose podcast lesson seven

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eighty three. Remember, learning another language is not easy, but

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it's not impossible, and I'm here to help you on

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your journey.

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Speaker 2: This podcast was brought to you by Happy English. Please

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visit Myhappy English dot Com show your support for Happy

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