English adjectives

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This article chiefly addresses adjectives in Modern English.

English adjectives form a large open category of words in English which, semantically, tend to denote properties such as size, colour, mood, quality, age, etc. with such members as other, big, new, good, different, Cuban, sure, important, and right.[1][2] Adjectives head adjective phrases, and the most typical members function as modifiers in noun phrases.[3] Most adjectives either inflect for grade (e.g., big, bigger, biggest) or combine with more and most to form comparatives (e.g., more interesting) and superlatives (e.g., most interesting).[4] They are characteristically modifiable by very (e.g., very small). A large number of the most typical members combine with the suffix -ly to form adverbs (e.g., final + ly: finally). Most adjectives function as complements in verb phrases (e.g., It looks good), and some license complements of their own (e.g., happy that you're here).[5]

  1. ^ Aarts, Bas, et al. The Oxford Dictionary of English Grammar. 2nd ed., Oxford University Press, 2014, doi:10.2307/3723099.
  2. ^ Leech, Geoffrey N. A Glossary of English Grammar. Edinburgh UP, 2006. ISBN 0-7486-2691-3.
  3. ^ Matthews, P. H. The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Linguistics. 3rd ed., Oxford University Press, 2014, doi:10.1093/acref/9780199675128.001.0001. ISBN 978-0-19-967512-8.
  4. ^ Huddleston, Rodney, Geoffrey K. Pullum, and Brett Reynolds. A Student's Introduction to English Grammar. 2nd ed., Cambridge University Press, 2022. p.157.
  5. ^ Huddleston, Rodney, and Geoffrey K. Pullum. The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language. Cambridge University Press, 2002. p. 57.