1. FOUNDATIONS OF
GRAMMAR
Podcast 6: What is an adjective?

2. What is an adjective?
Adjectives are words which describe nouns and pronouns. There are
many different types of adjectives, but essentially, they all function to
describe, identify and quantify nouns and pronouns.

3. Some types of adjective
•Descriptive – describe a noun
old man, small dog, big house, etc.
•Possessive (my, your, his, hers, its, ours, theirs)
– denote possession of the noun/pronoun
I left my car at home today.
•Interrogative (what, which) – ask a question about
the noun/pronoun
Which examples have you used?
•Demonstrative (this, these, that, those, what) –
point out the noun/pronoun
He is going to buy that car.

4. What is an adjective?
The position of the adjective in a sentence depends on the language being
studied. In English, the adjective will normally precede the noun or pronoun to
which it refers. E.g.
•I picked a bouquet of beautiful roses
•She bought an expensive, long dress
•She’s a very intelligent girl.
In the first sentence the adjective beautiful precedes roses, the noun it describes
In the second sentence the adjectives expensive and long come before the
noun dress which they describe.
The adjective intelligent precedes girl, the noun it modifies

5. What is an adjective?
• Often the adjective comes after the noun
• The house on the corner is new
• His results were excellent
In the first sentence the adjective new comes after the noun
house which it describes.
In the second sentence also the adjective excellent comes
after the noun results.
• In cases where an adjective follows a noun, there can be
additional words between the noun and adjective: the adjective
does not have to be located directly next to the noun. E.g.
The lecture they attended yesterday was very interesting.

6. What is an adjective?
Nouns can sometimes act as adjectives in order to describe other
nouns. E.g.
Italy produces excellent olive oil
The noun olive is acting as an adjective to describe the noun oil
My parents are history teachers
The noun history is acting as an adjective to describe the noun teachers
Silk dresses are very expensive.
In such cases, when a noun is acting as an adjective, it is used in singular. Only
the second noun takes the plural form

7. Adjective forms
NOTE: English adjectives only ever have the one form, but in some other
languages (for example, French, Italian, Latin, Greek and Spanish), adjectives
take different forms depending on the gender and number of the noun or
pronoun they modify.

8. Thank You
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