Questions tagged [adjectives]
An adjective is a word that describes a noun. In English the adjective usually (but not always) precedes the noun it describes.
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Is it allowed to use adjective clause inside the other adjective clause?
Original problem:
Understanding and using English Grammar 4th ed. By. B. S. Azar p. 291
Complete the sentences with your own words. Use adjective clauses.
In my apartment building, there are twenty ...
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“got the questions right (or wrong).”
I read a sentence.
I want to know if I got that question right!
I am not sure if the word right is an adjective or an adverb.
And the meaning of get is also unclear to me.
I looked up dictionaries ...
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1answer
41 views
Cancelled cheque or cancel cheque?
If cancelled is not an adjective then why we use the term "cancelled cheque"? What is cancelled here?
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“So as to make difficult the test” or “So as to make the test difficult”
Can one use (a) instead of (b)?
a. We changed the questions so as to make difficult the test.
b. We changed the questions so as to make the test difficult.
Or can one use (c) instead of (d)?
c. We ...
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Why doesn't “Kinda good” work as an attributive adjective?
The movie is kinda good. (Predicative - Sounds okay)
It is a kinda good movie. (Attributive - Sounds kinda wrong?)
Why is this so?
There were very few results for "is a kinda good movie" ...
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What is an antonym of the ajective “lawless”?
What word should I use if I wanted to invert the meaning of this phrase?
This security firm is a lawless force.
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Adjective to describe sadness tinged with despair
What’s an adjective I can use to describe sadness marked by a sense of despair.
She was suddenly hit with a wave of _____ sadness.
Does “despairing” work? If so, what are some other words that can ...
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What type of adjective is little? Descriptive or quantitative?
Consider the following sentence.
We should pay little attention to little things in life.
What type of adjective is little in this sentence? I am confused if it is descriptive or quantitative.
What ...
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“Hopeful”, “Promising” and “Hope-giving”
I need an adjective to imply that something is hope-giving.
I know two relevant words here, but I have no clue if they can be used interchangeably in this sense! That's why I decided to look for the ...
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21 views
When should I use next, upcoming and coming?
I'd like to know when should I use "next", "upcoming" and "coming"?
The Associated Press (AP) earlier on Monday reported the doses would
be shared in coming months ...
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Why is “escaping” a participle here?
The Cambridge Dictionary says:
In English, many past and present participles of verbs can be used as adjectives. Some of these examples may show the adjective use.
So there is no escaping from it: ...
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About the word 'unassisted'
he would go alone to the quarry, collect a load of broken stone and drag it down to the site of the windmill unassisted. (source: Orwell, George. Animal Farm (p. 43). Sanage Publishing House.)
I just ...
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a good improbable story
a. He told me a good improbable story.
b. He told me a good, improbable story.
c. He told me a good and improbable story.
Are all of the above grammatically correct and correctly punctuated?
Is there ...
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Bill alone cannot solve this problem
a. Bill alone cannot solve this problem. He needs help.
b. Bill alone cannot solve this problem. Everyone else in the class can.
Are both of the above grammatically correct?
Are they correctly ...
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2answers
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“It makes (economic) sense”, what are other adjective that can be used similarly?
I am used to hearing sentences like:
-It doesn't make much sense.
-It makes little sense.
-It makes
no sense.
-It makes perfect sense.
However, I find it makes economic sense really interesting ...
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23 views
Can I use “the ahead vehicle”?
If there are two vehicles on a road, and I want to differentiate them, can I say "the ahead vehicle", using ahead as an adjective?
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Is There A Word For Converger?
It seems that "Converger" is not even a word. However, I cannot express my question in any other way. I looked on the Internet with no luck.
I need a word or an official idiom to express an ...
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34 views
Use of 'lost' as an Adjective
'Lost' is past and past participle form of verb 'Lose'. It's also a pure adjective as it passes the test of Adjective category. So, we can write
I am lost. (Lost as Predictive Adjective)
I have been ...
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Clearer and beautiful way to express this phrase “quality of life”
I am writing a personal essay and reach writer's block on this part
A simple app that could help save time for my father convinced me of the potential of technology to not only improve the industry's ...
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bit vs a bit, which one to use when?
I've got a slight confusion while using them.
I believe "a bit" is used in the case when we are thinking from an "a little" perspective.
ex- he is a bit too late.
When shall we use ...
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1answer
23 views
“set” as a past participle or an adjective
I wonder if "set" in the sentence below is used as an adjective modifying "patterns" or a past participle as in "have set". Or could it be interpreted in both ways?
We ...
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46 views
Little or too little
I wonder if there are any differences between in the following sentences
in terms of meaning.
I have little money to buy a new car.
I have too little money to buy a new car.
As far as I know, both ...
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Adjective ‘Half’ & past participle ‘halved’
When is adjective or determiner Half used and, when is past participle modifier halved used attributively?
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Why is “excited” used to describe “anticipation”?
"They set out with an innocent, excited anticipation of the journey to come, but the five men quickly encounter reality in the form of blizzards, lighting, thirst, starvation and snakes" (An ...
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Pejorative vs negative: what's the difference in meaning and usage?
How is one different from the other in the sense of "criticism, bad opinion, disapproval"? Is one more formal, maybe?
I found the following collocations:
pejorative term
pejorative sense
...
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Which form of adjective should be used? [duplicate]
In the following sentence which form of the adjective should be used?
There were three four rooms in the hotel, the smallest/the smaller of which served as the gym.
I think it should be the smallest ...
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stiff set wings
In the dark the old man could feel the morning coming and as he rowed he heard the trembling sound as flying fish left the water and the housing that their stiff set wings made as they soared away in ...
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1answer
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Street smart: modify adjectives with nouns?
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 ...
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2answers
39 views
Does ‘half the half circle’ make sense?
Can ‘half the half circle’ be used instead of 1/4 circle? Or what should I say to express this? I guess a half half circle or half of a half circle?
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The difference between “each”, “both”, either
The issue is confusing to me. That's what I heard from natives.
1 The house has a door at either end.
2 The house has a door at both ends.
Some say that 1 and 2 are correct and mean that there are ...
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2answers
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Doesn’t an adjective describe a meaning of the noun? [closed]
I don’t understand ‘once-young adult’ is a possible phrase. Adjectives should describe a meaning of a noun, but ‘once-young’ does not qualify the noun because ‘adult’ means an old person.
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What is the part of speech of 'up' in the following sentences
He looked up and saw the stars.
The time is up.
The list is full of some ups and downs.
He has just been upped to the position of a president.
My answers are:
Adverb 2. Adjective 3. Noun 4. Verb
...
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When MUST we use noun phrase + adjective , not adjective + noun?
I always catch my students using adj + noun even when it's not suitable but I don't know how to explain why we can't always do that and what the rule is.
For example:
Mental health issue people need ...
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2answers
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unbearable discrimination
a. They spoke out against the unbearable discrimination they witnessed there.
b. They spoke out against the insufferable sexism in their workplace.
Do these imply that 'they' consider some amount of ...
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Poetic expression with an adjective
If a dog is surrounded by happy people, can I express it as ‘a dog happy around itself’? I mean, is it technically possible even though this expression is very rarely used?
In my native language, if ...
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Which paraphrase is correct?
Being about the same size as a domestic chicken, the kiwi bird lays eggs that are very large in proportion to its body size.
A) The eggs of the kiwi bird are much larger than those of a domestic ...
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‘Alive’ in phrase ‘get out alive’
There are no adverb alive, but how is ‘get out alive’ grammatical? Is alive an adjectival complement? However, get out is not copular and a predicative adjective should be after a linking verb.
The ...
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Is “not enough exhaustive” correct?
Two options to complete the following sentence:
Is it _____ exhaustive or not _______ exhaustive?
Options:
too
too / too
enough
According to my teacher it's "Is it too exhaustive or not ...
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Quality qualifies quality
I don’t understand how a quality qualifies the same quality (even though my native language does).
For example, small size, yellow color, hot weather.
I think size is small, color is yellow and ...
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Slightly weaker adjective than “heavily” in “heavily used”?
This is a very simple question, but I found it's something hard to search for on the internet. When something is used a lot, we can say "something is heavily used". If it's almost abandoned, ...
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Can I use “box of chocolates” and “chocolate box” interchangeably?
The same with "list of cities" vs "city list", or "list of users" vs "user list", etc.
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Can I avoid an oxymoron like this?
‘Nonperson person’ is an oxymoron. Then, what about ‘yesterday-nonperson person’ as in ‘the werewolf is now a yesterday-nonperson person’? It means he was a nonperson wolf yesterday, but he changed ...
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44 views
What part of speech is up in the sentence, the time is up
This sentence, the time is up, is confusing me. I think up is a preposition
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“to be keenly interested in”
It is correct to use "to be keenly interested in", but "to be keen on sth" means "to be interested in sth", and so, isn't it essentially saying "interestedly ...
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Is “drawable” a correct word?
In French, we have the word "dessinable" which is an adjective for something that can be "dessiné" or in English that can be drawn.
However, when I search the term "drawable&...
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Clear-watered pond - is this right?
Is "clear-watered" an adjective like "soft-petalled"?
Is it right to say, "The clear-watered pond was serene to look at"
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How to understand “They were not looking at you funny”?
A quote from the movie The Guardians of the Galaxy vol 2:
They were not looking at you funny.
How to explain the syntactic construction of this sentence? Why does the speaker put funny at the end?
I ...
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ed forms of Adjectives for intransitive verbs
Why there are no adjectives(-ed form)for intransitive verbs, for example, words like happened (It was happened), occurred (It was occurred), etc, While transitive verbs having the adjectives ending ...
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Is it always possible to use the pattern “the + adjective”?
I found out that it's possible to use the definite article "the" with adjectives, to refer to a group of people with a particular characteristic, e.g. the rich, the disabled, the poor, and ...
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Prepositional Phrase vs Participle Phrase
Following the meeting, we all had a chat.
In the above sentence, what is Following used as. Is it a adjective or preposition or both?
Also,is following the meeting a prepositional phrase or participle ...
