The Use of Adjectives and Adverbs

The colors brown, blue, and purple are nouns but not adjectives in this case because they take an article e.g. (“The couch is a deep purple.”). Also, the colors brown, blue and purple apparently make the subject to take an idiomatic expression and stand out. Another example is in this statement “She loves the color blue.” The color blue is used here as a noun; therefore, color can also be used as a noun in a sentence.

Exercise 4

 Iron (Adjective)

Frisky (adjective)

Brick (adjective)

Friendly (adjective)

Scathing (adjective)

Dripping (adjective)

Understated (adjective)

Screaming (adjective)

Leather (adjective)

Exercises 7

A pronominal adjective usually precedes a noun that it modifies while predicate adjectives do modify subject of a sentence and is connected to the subject by a linking verb. They also appear after a noun phrase or subject noun (Lobeck & Denham 2013). Consider this example “That orange seems nice and sweet.”  The adjectives nice and sweet are predicate adjectives. In this case, the following adjectives take the positions of either pronominal adjective or predicate adjectives. Predicate positions include same, polished, fresh, off-white, six, wearing, loose and flaming while pronominal adjective positions  include silver, tall, quite and shiny.    

Exercise 1

a. A bat slowly flew under the eaves.

b. Patricia extremely enjoys playing Scrabble

c. Four ships quietly appeared on the horizon.

d. The bus driver happily waved at the children.

e. Leland quietly told me that Bert should get a haircut

Exercise 2 (adjectives and adverbs)

(a) Hilary hammered the metal flat.

(b) Gertrude pushed him flat on the mat.

(c) The children ate the carrots fast.

(d) The children ate the carrots nude.

(e) The pitcher held the ball tight.

(f) He held the reins slack

(g) We ate a late dinner.

(h)We ate dinner late.

(i) Sybil looks great.

(j) Bert sings well.

(k) Jorge feels sick.

(l) They ate the pie slow.

(m) She looked sickly.

(n) Millicent went to the meeting sober.

A. Flat is an adverb since it describes the verb

B. Flat is an adverb since it describes the verb

C. Fast is an adverb since it describes the verb

D. Tight an adverb since it describes the verb

E. Slack is adverb since it describes the verb

F. Late is an adjective since it describes the noun

G. Late is adverb since it describes the verb

H. Great is an adjective since it describes the noun

I. Well is adverb since it describes the verb

J. Sick is adverb since it describes the verb

K. Slow is an adjective since it describes the noun

L. Sickly is an adverb since it describes the verb

M. Sober is an adjective since it describes the noun

Exercise 5

Degree modifiers are used to modify adverbs or adjectives, for example, consider the sentence (Lobeck & Denham 2013): I am moderately happy. The word moderately is a degree modifier and in this case the following words are degree modifiers:

Possibly

Shockingly

Significantly

Unexpectedly

Visibly

Inherently

 Incredibly

Overly

Annoyingly

Meticulously

Equally

Horribly

Outrageously

Sinfully

Barely

Unexpectedly

Foolishly

For example, consider the sentence; John was significantly present at the meeting. The word significantly emphasizes on John’s presence and it shows that John could be seen present by everyone who attended the meeting.  

Reference

Lobeck, A & Denham, K. (2013). Navigating English Grammar: A Guide to Analyzing Real Language (p. 184). Wiley. Kindle Edition.