Types Of Adjectives

An adjective is an essential part of speech, which helps to modify a noun in any particular sentence. It has two main roles in a sentence. While predicative adjectives modify a noun that follows it and is linked by a verb, attributive adjectives modify a noun by directly being linked to the noun as part of the noun phrase. Adjectives don’t form a part of speech in all languages. In several Native American languages, verbs are used to fill in the role adjectives play in case of English language. This article deals with the various kinds of adjectives one comes across in spoken or written form of a language.

 

Descriptive adjectives can be classified into different categories such as color, size, sound, taste, touch, shape, time, personality and age.

Colors as adjectives: Black, Blue, White, Green, Red

Sizes as adjectives: Big, Small, Large, Thin, Thick

Shapes as adjectives: Triangular, Round, Square, Circular

Qualities as adjectives: Good, Bad, Mediocre

Personality traits as adjectives: Happy, Sad, Angry, Depressed     

Time as adjective: Yearly, Monthly, Annually    

 

This form of adjective is not part of the noun phrase followed by the noun it modifies, but it is the complement of a copulative function, which links it to the noun. For instance, in the sentence, “The house is big”, the predicative adjective here is “big”, which is linked to the noun “house”, by the verb “is”. Most of the descriptive adjectives can be also used as predicative adjectives. Pronouns can also be used as adjectives, like in the sentence “He is happy”. Even hyphenated adjectives containing past participles are used as predicate adjectives, like in the sentence “The belief is widespread”. However, there are also few adjectives which are only used predicatively. They are words such as “Afloat”, “Afraid”, “Alive”, “Alone”, “Asleep” and “Aglow”.

Titles such as Mr, Mrs, Auntie, Uncle, Dr and Lord are classified as adjectives, if they are attached in front of a name. For instance, in the sentence “Did you visit Uncle Neil on your way back home?” Herein the word “Uncle” is an adjective.

 

This form of adjective is used in a sentence before a noun to indicate possession. For instance, in the sentence, “ Do not touch my diary. It is personal.”, the word “my” inserted just in front of the noun “diary” is the adjective. Few other examples of possessive adjectives are “your”, “his”, “her”, “our”, “their”, etc. 

 

This form of adjective is used to demonstrate or indicate certain things. For instance, in the sentence, “Parents of only those students, who have not managed to pass in all subjects, will have to come for tomorrow’s parents-teachers meeting.” The word “those” indicates a particular lot of students who have failed in their test. Placed before the noun “students”, this is a form of demonstrative adjective. Other such adjectives are “that”, “these”, “this”, etc. 

 

While demonstrative adjectives point out specific things, indefinite adjectives do not indicate anything specific. Indefinite adjectives are formed from indefinite pronouns and the most common ones among them are “any”, “many”, few”, “several”, etc. In the sentence, “Several soldiers died in the Pacific War.”, the word “several” placed just before the noun “soldiers” is an adjective, which does not indicate the specific number of soldiers, who died in the war.