Saturday 25 February 2017

How to use adjectives in the right order?

II MOP, IV SEMESTER
M SCHEME, ENGLISH II

Have you ever seen the sentence as the following one?
I bought a beautiful small shining round new black Indian metal boat-like gift for my friend’s marriage.
When we use more than one adjective before a noun, we have to arrange them in a certain order as per grammar rules.

The usual order is as follows:
1. Opinion – beautiful, brilliant, smart, effective….
2. Size -  small, big, tall, short, long, large….
3. Physical quality – thin, fat, slim, tidy, weak….
4. Shape –round, square, rectangular…
5. Age – old, New, young, middle-aged, ancient…
6. Colour- black, red, green, blue…
7. Origin – Indian, Japanese, American, African….
8. Material- wooden, metallic, rubber, silver, golden…
9. Type – moon-like, four-sided, T-shaped….
10. Noun -the person, object, quality we describe-  lady, ball, knowledge….

How to remember the order is more difficult than how to understand or differentiate them. Since only few of them always join and make a phrase, the usage is always easy.

To remember the most common elements (opinion, size, age, colour, origin, material) students may associate them with an imaginary or well known phrase.  Example: osa.com (opinion, size, age, colour, origin, material)

K. Arrange the following into a sentence according to the order of adjectives:
1. A black, wooden, old, toy
2. A winding, long, street
3. A leather,  black,  bag
4. A silver, costly, ring
5. A young, beautiful, Indian lady
6. A green,  rubber,  new,  ball
7. A pink,  round, smart, clock
8. An American, handsome, guy
9. A wooden, old, useless, stool
10. A moon-like, round, cute, face

Answer:
1. It is an old black wooden toy.
2. There is a long winding street.
3. It is a black leather bag.
4. I bought a costly silver ring.
5. I met a beautiful young Indian lady.
6. I played with new green rubber ball.
7. I have a smart round pink clock.
8. He is really a handsome American guy.
9. This is a useless old wooden stool.
10. She has a cute round moon-like face.

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