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What happened in example [3] also happened in the use of adverb of place. A reporter can use there or here based on the place where she is reporting.
Some shifts in adverb of time are presented in Table 2.3.
Table 2.3: Shifts in Adverbial Time Celce-Murcia and Larsen Freeman, 1999: 697 Direct Speech
Indirect Speech
this… day, afternoon, etc. that… day, afternoon, etc.
now then at that time
todaytonight that daythat night
yesterday the day before the previous day
tomorrow the day after the next day
the next… the following…
…ago …before
4 Word Order
According to Swan 1980, shift in word order happens in indirect question. It is because the direct question should be changed into statement in
indirect speech.
b. Basic Forms of Indirect Speech
Thomson and Martinet 1986 mention some basic forms of indirect speech based on the types of sentence being derived. They are indirect statement,
indirect question, indirect command and indirect exclamation.
1 Indirect Statement
Indirect statement is derived from direct statement. Reporting verb in indirect statement can be in the form of present or past. When the reporting verb is
in the form of past tense, there will be tense shifts.
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2 Indirect Question
According to Thomson and Martinet 1986: 260, in transferring direct question into indirect question, there should be shifts in the tenses, pronouns,
possessives, and adverb of time or place. Swan 1980 mentions that shift in word order will also happen because the direct question should be changed into
statement in indirect speech. Besides, the question mark should not be used since the form of interrogative is changed to affirmative.
Reporting verbs that are usually used in indirect speech are ask, inquire, wonder, and want to know. When ask is used, it can be followed by an indirect
object. Meanwhile, the word inquire, wonder, and want to know are not followed by indirect object.
Question can be divided into two forms. The first is WH-questions, or questions which use questions word when, where, who, why, which, how. The
second is yes-no questions or questions with no question words. It will be some differences in forming those two different forms of question. Thomson and
Martinet 1986: 260 state, in transferring direct WH-question into indirect WH- question, the question word should be repeated in the indirect form, for example:
[4] She said, “What do you want?” She asked them what they wanted. Thomson and Martinet, 1986:
260 In Yes-No question, conjunction if or whether can be used, but it is more usual to
use if. For example: [5] “Did you see the accident?” the police officer asked.
