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There are a couple of ways to express motion in English. One way is to use a simple motion verb with an adverb of manner, as in to “walk unsteadily” or to “move slowly.” However, another way is to use the fantastic range of specific motion verbs available in English, such as “stagger” and “dawdle,” that can capture very specific types of motion. Here are some examples…
Ex. I sprang up out of my seat and dashed to the door.
To spring is to “move or jump suddenly or rapidly upward or forward.”
To dash is to “run or travel somewhere in a great hurry.”
Ex. He staggered across the street and slumped down on the sidewalk.
To stagger is to “walk or move unsteadily, as if about to fall.”
To slump is to “sit, lean, or fall heavily and limply, especially with a bent back.”
Ex. The dog bounded across the field and flopped over on its side under a tree.
To bound is to “walk or run with leaping strides.”
To flop is to “fall, move, or hang in a heavy, loose, and ungainly way.”
Many verbs that express the movements of animals can also express humans’ movements, sometimes in unexpected ways!
Insects crawl and so do babies, moving slowly and low to the ground. Traffic can also crawl or inch forward when there are many cars causing a traffic jam.
Cats slink and so do sneaky people, such as thieves. To slink is to “move smoothly and quietly with gliding steps, in a stealthy or sensuous manner.”
Hummingbirds hover, floating in the air, but people can also hover by standing over someone. Perhaps when you were a child in school, your teacher hovered over you, checking your work.
This is a very small selection of the many, many wonderful motion verbs in English. If you’d like to learn a few more, try looking up dawdle, limp, recoil, slip, strut, stumble, sway, or zip. Then, keep an eye (and an ear!) out for more motion verbs in your studies!
I hope this inspires you to use more specific motion verbs to express different forms of movement in English!
Zach
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