2

I was confused by the roles of nouns in English. It seems that nouns can modify verbs as stated in this qeustion and adjectives in these examples:

Do You Know How to Be Street Smart?
... the prior predictive kernel distributions are not orders of magnitude different from the observed data.

Sources:

  1. https://kidshealth.org/en/kids/street-smart.html
  2. https://www.nature.com/articles/s43586-020-00001-2

I wonder if the two types of nouns act the same role? In the above sentence is street acting as an adverb? Or something else? When can we modify adjectives with nouns?

Improve this question
3
  • 1
    I think these are compounds, like the noun-verb compounds referred to in your other question. Street smart = knowing how to look after yourself in public places. Other examples that occur to me are book learned = having acquired one's knowledge from books, and trigger happy = prone to firing guns irresponsibly. – Kate Bunting Mar 28 at 16:41
  • 2
    "Street-smart" is a compound adjective, where the first base is a noun and the second an adjective. Note the hyphen. – BillJ Mar 28 at 17:29
  • 1
    You are making a common ELL mistake - thinking than an idiom reveals some hidden rule of grammar. It doesn’t. This is an idiom. – FeliniusRex Mar 28 at 22:36
0

Do You Know How to Be Street Smart?

Q. In the above sentence is street acting as an adverb? Or something else? When can we modify adjectives with nouns?

A.1 Street-Smart is an adjective and is the American translation of The UK's "streetwise" Ref C.E.D.

A.2

Attributive Nouns - A noun can also be used like an adjective to modify another noun. Ref Grammar Monster

For example: diamond ring; car door

In these examples, the examples "diamond," and "car" are functioning like adjectives. When nouns are used like this, they're called "attributive nouns."

Compound Adjective - A compound adjective is a single adjective made up of more than one word. The words in a compound adjective are usually grouped together using hyphens to show it is a single adjective. Ref Grammar Monster

Here are some example of compound adjectives:

four-foot table, 12-page magazine, free-range eggs, never-to-be-forgotten experience, well-deserved award

Improve this answer

Your Answer

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service, privacy policy and cookie policy

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged or ask your own question.