The Adjective
Morphological Characteristics |
Morphological Composition |
Syntactical Functions |
positive, comparative, superlative: big-bigger-the biggest; beautiful - more beautiful - the most beautiful
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big, little, sad
beautiful , unkind, unlawful
snow-white, life-giving,
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Classification of Adjectives
Qualitative |
Relative |
little, large, soft, hard, etc. grammatical characteristics: - degrees of comparison: big - bigger - the biggest;
-ful, - ous, - less, - ent, - able, - y, - ish: careful, famous, careless, comfortable, greenish, silvery
comfortable - comfortably
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grammatical characteristics:
wooden, socialist, economic, economical, historic, historical, etc. - don't form adverbs by the suffix - ly - chiefly used as attributes and predicatives: The morning was windy. He was sitting in a big wooden chair.
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Degrees of Comparison
Regular |
Irregular |
small- smaller- the smallest
early- earlier-the earliest narrow-narrower-the narrowest simple- simpler- the simplest - 2-syllable words with the stress on the second syllable: polite- politer-the politest 2. - more, - the most
honest- more honest- the most honest interesting-more interesting-the most interesting - words ending in ful or less, e.g. helpful, useful; hopeless - words ending in ing or ed, e.g. boring, willing; annoyed, - many others, e.g. afraid, certain, correct, eager, exact, famous, foolish, frequent, modern, nervous, normal, recent
Spelling rules: - busy-busier-the busiest - sad - sadder - the saddest, hot – hotter –the hottest (thin, red, big, fat, wet, mad) but: rich- richer, fast –faster etc |
good - better - the best bad/ill - worse - the worst
far - farther - the farthest ( distance only) - further - the furthest (distance and “more”, “additional”) (farther/ further bank of the river; но: further information) much - more (uncount) -the most many - more (count) -the most little - less - the least (opposites of more and most.) Used with both long and short words. (less expensive, less tired)
old - older - the oldest (people, building) Tom looks older than he is - elder -the eldest (about family members) late - later - the latest - latter - the last Note: the latest (news, fashion, book, film, etc) the last page (day of the month, thing to do, etc.) the former and the latter ( spoken of 2 things, people): Psychologists say there are 2 types of people: type A and type B. The former (первые) are more ambitious than the latter (последние).
near - nearer - the nearest (distance) e.g. the nearest hotel - nearer - the next (subsequent) e.g. We live in the next house
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