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I'm a Japanese learner of English.

I have a question about an indefinite pronoun "one."

Can "one" is used as follows?

a(n) + an adjective + one + an adjective phrase (or an adjective clause)

Also, can "ones" is used as follows?

an adjective + ones + an adjective phrase (or an adjective clause)

For example, is the following sentence correct grammatically?

I want to buy a car, especially a red one made in America.

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  • Your proposed sentence looks fine to me.
    – mdewey
    Commented Apr 21, 2021 at 14:56

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The use of "one" here is perfect. But "especially" is the wrong word in this case. It sounds like there are several different cars and you want to buy all of them, especially the American one. You probably really only want to buy one car, and so "preferably" would be a better choice.

We can also phrase it as "an American car" rather than "a car made in America": both are acceptable but the first one is more idiomatic, unless you really mean the place of manufacture/assembly (for example a car from a Japanese company which was assembled in America).

I want to buy a car, preferably a red American one.

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  • Or with a slightly different emphasis, specifically rather than preferably might be closer to what the OP wants to convey. In which context, specifically might well imply the speaker has no interest whatsoever in buying any other kind of car, whereas preferably strongly implies speaker would consider a blue American car, or a red Japanese one, for example, if his exact specification can't be met.
    – FumbleFingers
    Commented Apr 21, 2021 at 14:30

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