adjectives
DESCRIPTION
TRANSCRIPT
ADJECTIVES
Adjectives
Adjectives are words that describe or modify another person or thing in the sentence. The Articles — a, an, and the — are adjectives.
Examples:1. The tall professor.2. The lugubrious lieutenant. 3. A solid commitment.4. A month's pay.5. A six-year-old child.6. The unhappiest, richest man.
Type of Adjectives
– Possessive Adjectives– Demonstrative Adjectives– Interrogative Adjectives– Indefinite Adjectives
• Descriptive Adjectives• Limiting Adjectives• Predicate Adjectives
DESCRIPTIVE ADJECTIVE:
• These types of adjectives add detail or description to the noun.
Example:1. Monica said, "Wow, this is a great game2. A worthwhile rivalry had been born.
LIMITING ADJECTIVE:
• These types of adjectives specify or limit the noun.
Examples:1. The two teams have met every season
since 1932.2. Will you be sitting at the captain's table
this evening?
PREDICATE ADJECTIVE
• This is a special type of adjective that follows a linking verb and modifies (directly refers to) the subject of the sentence.
Examples:1. People are interested in this game.2. Sheena is beautiful.
Adjective Clause
If a group of words containing a subject and verb acts as an adjective, it is called an Adjective Clause. My sister, who is much older than I am, is an engineer.
Adjective Phrase
If an adjective clause is stripped of its subject and verb, the resulting modifier becomes an Adjective Phrase: He is the man who is keeping my family in the poorhouse.
Position of Adjective
Adjectives appear immediately before the noun or noun phrase that they modify. Sometimes they appear in a string of adjectives, and when they do, they appear in a set order according to category.
Position of Adjective
When indefinite pronouns — such as something, someone, anybody — are modified by an adjective, the adjective comes after the pronoun.
Example:
1. Anyone capable of doing something horrible to someone nice should be punished.
2. Something wicked this way comes.
Degrees of Comparison
PositiveComparativeSuperlative
Comparative
Used in comparing two persons or things.
Superlative
Used in comparing three or more persons or
things.
Take Note!
The word than frequently accompanies the comparative.
The word the precedes the superlative.
Take Note!
The inflected suffixes -er and -est suffice to form most comparatives and superlatives, although we need -ier and -iest when a two-syllable adjective ends in y (happier and happiest); otherwise we use more and most when an adjective has more than one syllable.
Examples
Positive Comparative Superlative
rich richer richest
lovely lovelier loveliest
beautiful more beautiful most beautiful
Take Note!Certain adjectives have irregular forms in the comparative and superlative
degrees.
Irregular Comparative and Superlative Forms
good better bestbad worse worstlittle less leastmuchmanysome
more most
far further furthest
Order of Adjectives• Determiners — articles and other limiters. See Determiners • Observation — postdeterminers and limiter adjectives (e.g., a real
hero, a perfect idiot) and adjectives subject to subjective measure (e.g., beautiful, interesting)
• Size and Shape — adjectives subject to objective measure (e.g., wealthy, large, round)
• Age — adjectives denoting age (e.g., young, old, new, ancient) • Color — adjectives denoting color (e.g., red, black, pale) • Origin — denominal adjectives denoting source of noun (e.g., French,
American, Canadian) • Material — denominal adjectives denoting what something is made of
(e.g., woolen, metallic, wooden) • Qualifier — final limiter, often regarded as part of the noun (e.g.,
rocking chair, hunting cabin, passenger car, book cover)
Order of AdjectivesDetermin
erObservati
onPhysical Description Origin Material Qualifier Noun
Size Shape Age Color
five huge young black Canadian bears
battered old shapel
ess gray cotton work pants
many magnificent antique British referen
ce books
one studious teenag
ed American boy
few shiny round blue Indian gems
five huge young black Canadian bears
battered old shapel
ess gray cotton work pants
many magnificent antique British referen
ce books
one studious teenag
ed American boy
few shiny round blue Indian gems
many well-made tiny elongat
ed brown wooden fishing boats
several cheap large purple polyester
sleeping bags
A-Adjectives
The most common of the so-called a- adjectives are ablaze, afloat, afraid, aghast, alert, alike, alive, alone, aloof, ashamed, asleep, averse, awake, aware. These adjectives will primarily show up as predicate adjectives (i.e., they come after a linking verb).– The children were ashamed. – The professor remained aloof. – The trees were ablaze.
A-Adjectives
Occasionally, however, you will find a- adjectives before the word they modify: the alert patient, the aloof physician. Most of them, when found before the word they modify, are themselves modified: the nearly awake student, the terribly alone scholar. And a- adjectives are sometimes modified by "very much": very much afraid, very much alone, very much ashamed, etc.
EXERCISES
And he hastened straight down, running over the wet, sodden fields, pushing through the hedges, down into the depression of callous, wintry obscurity. It took him several minutes to come to the pond. He stood on the bank, breathing heavily. He could see nothing. His eyes seemed to penetrate the dead water. Yes, perhaps that was the dark shadow of her black clothing beneath the surface of the water.
He slowly ventured into the pond. The bottom was deep, soft clay, then he sank in, and the water clasped . . . his legs. As he stirred he could smell the cold, rotten clay that fouled up into the water. It was objectionable in his lungs. Still, repelled and yet not heeding, he moved deeper into the pond. The cold water rose over his thighs, over his loins, upon his abdomen. The lower part of his body was all sunk in the hideous cold element. And the bottom was so deeply soft and uncertain, he was afraid of pitching with his mouth underneath. He could not swim, and was afraid.
And he hastened straight down, running over the wet, sodden fields, pushing through the hedges, down into the depression of callous, wintry obscurity. It took him several minutes to come to the pond. He stood on the bank, breathing heavily. He could see nothing. His eyes seemed to penetrate the dead water. Yes, perhaps that was the dark shadow of her black clothing beneath the surface of the water.
He slowly ventured into the pond. The bottom was deep, soft clay, then he sank in, and the water clasped . . . his legs. As he stirred he could smell the cold, rotten clay that fouled up into the water. It was objectionable in his lungs. Still, repelled and yet not heeding, he moved deeper into the pond. The cold water rose over his thighs, over his loins, upon his abdomen. The lower part of his body was all sunk in the hideous cold element. And the bottom was so deeply soft and uncertain, he was afraid of pitching with his mouth underneath. He could not swim, and was afraid.