Part 3 Nouns and Noun Groups
Classifiers (Adjectives and Noun Modifiers)
Examples
They always told us that one day we would move into a house, a real house that would be ours … And our house would have running water and pipes that worked. And inside it would have real stairs, not hallway stairs … Our house would be white with trees around it, a great big yard and grass … This was the house Papa talked about when he held a lottery ticket. (Sandra Cisneros, The House on Mango Street)
Definition
Learners are introduced to basic adjectives very early: a red car, a big book, a hard question. Adjectives are a class of words that modify nouns (and, less often, pronouns). They sometimes carry descriptive information (size, color, origin, material), but they can also be evaluative (hard, easy, fortunate, sad, interesting) or tell us about the type of noun (political science, molecular structure, national interests).
The WIDA Framework uses the broader term classifier, which includes noun modifiers. It’s important to realize that nouns often modify other nouns, usually by classifying them, that is, by saying what type or category of thing is meant. Examples include computer science, grammar textbook, water cycle, tree frog, information technology.
Form
The form of adjectives is fairly straight-forward in English since they don’t inflect: we say two red cars, not *two reds cars. Most adjectives are happy in the noun phrase or after a linking verb (known as a predicative adjective):
| Adjective in the noun group | Adjective in the predicate |
| the red car | the car is red |
| a hard question | the question is hard |
| a sad movie | the movie became sad |
A small number of descriptive adjectives cannot be used in the noun group. Strangely, they all seem to begin with the letter a:
| Adjective in the noun group (* = not acceptable) | Adjective in the predicate |
| *an alive flower | the flower is alive |
| *an alone person | leave me alone |
| *an asleep baby | the baby is asleep |
Adjectives and nouns that classify can only be used in the noun group without changing the meaning:
| Classifier in the noun group | Adjective in the predicate (* = not acceptable |
| political science | *the science is political |
| information technology | *technology is information |
| molecular structure | *the structure is molecular |
It is possible to use multiple adjectives and nouns in the noun group, in which case there’s a preferred order. This is not a rule but rather a pattern that has emerged through usage. Since we rarely use more than 2 or 3 modifiers in a noun group, this point is rarely worth teaching explicitly, but it’s useful to know as a reference (adapted from Celce-Murcia & Larsen Freeman, 1999, p. 394). Roughly, the sequence is from subjective to objective, with classifying adjectives and noun modifiers last:
| determiner | opinion | measurement | shape | condition/age | color | origin/material | classifier | head noun |
| a | beautiful | large | round | used | red | wooden | toy | car |
This pattern is easier to test intuitively in more realistic phrases:
my favorite red pen (not *my red favorite pen)
the dangerous South American tree frog (not *the South American dangerous tree frog)
An important feature of descriptive adjectives is that they can be modified by adverbs, specifically intensifiers (adverbs that turn the volume up or down on the adjective):
very happy
somewhat confident
unusually cold
Function
It is useful to differentiate between descriptive and classifying adjectives. Noun modifiers always have the function of classifying. This is different from the conventional definition of adjectives as “describing words” – yes, they often describe things, but they also classify. For example, a social problem is a type of problem, not a description of the problem. Not surprisingly, descriptive adjectives are very common in narrative texts, and classifying nouns and adjectives appear in most types of informative and explanatory texts.
| Adjectives | Nouns | |
| Descriptive | thick hair red balloon heavy rain |
N/A |
| Classifying | American history electric guitar cloud formations |
science textbook baby food vocabulary list |
