What is Adjective?

An adjective is a word which modifies a noun, that is, shows or points out some distinguishing
mark or feature of the noun.

List of Descriptive Adjectives

Descriptive adjectives can be divided into different categories such as colors, sizes, sound, taste,
touch, shapes, qualities, time, personality and ages.

 Colors are adjectives : black, blue, white, green, red

 Sizes : big, small, large, thin, thick
 Shapes: triangular, round, square, circular
 Qualities: good, bad, mediocre
 Personality : happy, sad, angry, depressed
 Time : Yearly , monthly, annually
 Ages : new, young, old, brand-new, second-hand
 Sound related Adjectives : loud, noisy, quiet, silent
 Touch related Adjectives t: slippery, sticky
 Taste related Adjectives : juicy, sweet

(* Exercise 1-3: Find the adjective)

Attributive and Predicative Adjectives

Most adjectives can occur both before and after a noun:

the blue sea ~ the sea is blue

the old man ~ the man is old
happy children ~ the children are happy

Adjectives in the first position - before the noun - are called ATTRIBUTIVE
adjectives. Those in the second position - after the noun - are called
PREDICATIVE adjectives. Notice that predicative adjectives do not occur
immediately after the noun.

A predicate adjective modifies the subject of the sentence. In the sentence “The flowers
are blue,” the subject is “the flowers.” In this example, “blue” is what modifies the
subject, “the flowers,” and is connected to the subject by what is known as a linking verb.
Having predicate adjectives means that we can describe subjects without putting the
adjectives before him. Instead of having to say, “The good boy” followed by a verb, we
can simply say, “the boy is good.” In this sentence, we can identify that “the boy” is the
subject, “is” is the linking verb, and “good” is the predicate adjective. “Good” effectively
renames the subject of the sentence.

More examples:

her new dress

a kind person
the phonetic alphabet
accuracy is important
She had a beautiful smile
He bought two brown bread rolls.
Her smile is beautiful
She didn’t seem happy
He handed me a bucket of hot water. (attributive position)
I put my hand in the bucket, the water was very hot. (predicative position, emphasising
hot.)

There are a few adjectives which cannot occur in both predicative and attributive
position. Some only occur in attributive position (they can't function as a predicate).
Examples include "main" and "former".

2. Position: attributive only

There are some adjectives which can only be used before a noun, in the attributive
position. For instance, we talk about the main problem but cannot say, the problem was
main.

Adjectives which occur only in the attributive position are generally those which identify
something as being of a particular type. For instance, we can talk about a financial
decision where financial distinguishes this from other types of decision, e.g.: medical,
political. This group of adjectives are often referred to as classifying adjectives, and
rarely occur in the predicative position unless we specifically want to emphasise a
contrast, e.g.:

For example:

• This is the main reason.

* This reason is main. (ungrammatical)
• This is the former president.
* This president is former. (ungrammatical)

a chemical reaction not, e.g.: a reaction which was/is chemical

the phonetic alphabet not, e.g.: the alphabet is phonetic

It was an indoor pool. not, e.g.: The pool was indoor

Other adjectives which generally appear in the attributive position are those which are
used for emphasis, e.g.:

The show was absolute/utter rubbish.

You made me look a complete fool.

Anchor Point:33. Position: predicative only

There are some adjectives which only usually occur in the predicative position, as
complements of be or other link verbs. For instance, you can say He felt glad. but
wouldn’t normally talk about a glad person.

Adjectives which usually occur in the predicative position include those which describe
feelings, such as afraid, content, glad, ready, sure, sorry and upset, e.g.:

She felt afraid. but not, e.g.: an afraid girl

My daughter is upset. but not, e.g.: my upset daughter

They also include a group of adjectives with prefix a-, such as asleep, alive, alone,
ashamed, awake, aware, e.g.:

I like being alone. but not, e.g.: I like being an alone person.

The baby’s asleep. but not, e.g.: the asleep baby.

A few other adjectives can only be predicative, i.e. they can't occur in attributive position.
An example of this is "alone":

• This man is alone.

* This is an alone man. (ungrammatical)