TOPIC 14 - Expresión de la cualidad.

Expresión de grado y comparación

INTRODUCTION
1. ADJECTIVES IN ENGLISH
1.1 FORM
1.2 STRUCTURE
1.3 TYPES
2. ADJECTIVAL CLAUSES
3. DIFFERENT AMOUNTS OF QUALITY: DEGREE
4. COMPARING THINGS
CONCLUSION
BIBLIOGRAPHY

INTRODUCTION

The concept “expressing quality” implies a different meaning from the

concept “qualitative adjective”. On the contrary, it involves a profound
change in linguistic terminology, a different approach to language that
views it as a set of categories used to express different functions.
The expression of quality, degree and comparison may be expressed by
different means, which we will try to analyse in full detail throughout this
topic. The most important things to notice about an adjective in English
are: what structure it is in and what type of adjective it is.
We will start this topic by analysing the adjectives in English, we will go on
talking about adjectival clauses and finally we’ll talk about comparisons
and degree.

1. ADJECTIVES IN ENGLISH

We can define an adjective by saying that it is a word used to describe or

to give information about a noun, or rather more fully, a word that
qualifies a noun, adds to its meaning and limits its application.
Despite this definition it is sometimes difficult to distinguish adjectives
from other parts of speech, especially adverbs. The suffix –ly, which may
be taken as the formal distinction is missing in many cases while in others

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 TOPIC 14 - Expresión de la cualidad. Expresión de grado y comparación

is found in both, adjectives and adverbs. In order to make a more clear

distinction of adjectives, we must take into account its FORM, STRUCTURE
and TYPES.

1.1 FORM

Adjectives in English have the same form for singular and plural, for
masculine and feminine. The only exception are the demonstrative
adjectives this / that that change to these / those in the plural. Some can
have the inflectional endings –er / -est, while others are compared by
means of more and most.
In English, the same word can function in two different ways. Thus, we
have verbs derived from adjectives (clean) that can function as verbs and
adjectives; words that function as nouns and adjectives (sweet) and
words that can function as both adjectives and adverbs (fast, early).
Participles are verbal adjectives, both present (an interesting book) and
past participles (a used match) that can be used to qualify a noun, but the
meaning changes: boring = having this effect; bored = affected in this
way.

1.2 STRUCTURE

Adjectives are nearly always used in connection with a noun or pronoun to

give information about the person, thing or group referred to. When this
information is not the main purpose of a statement, adjectives are placed
in front of a noun, as in hot coffee. Adjectives which are used in a noun
group are said to be used attributively: a beautiful house.
Sometimes, however, the main purpose of a statement is to give the
information expressed by an adjective. When this happens, adjectives are
placed after a link verb such as “be” or “become” as in I’m cold and he
became ill. Adjectives which are used after a link verb are said to be
used predicatively. They are called the complement of the link verb. The
subject can be any noun group, including pronouns: He became angry.

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 TOPIC 14 - Expresión de la cualidad. Expresión de grado y comparación

When several adjectives come before a noun, they usually have to be put
in a particular order: opinion, size, age, shape, colour, origin, material and
inherent + noun
A nice big old narrow red Spanish wooden sofa-bed

1.3 TYPES OF ADJECTIVES

There are many possible classifications of adjectives. In this topic we are

going to present the classification provided by The Cobuild Grammar,
according to which adjectives are divided into the following categories:
 Qualitative adjectives identify qualities which someone or
something has. This group includes words such as: happy,
intelligent, healthy…
These adjectives are gradable, which means that the person or thing
related to can have more or less of the quality mentioned. The usual
way in which we can indicate the amount of a quality that something
or someone has is by using submodifiers such as very and rather
in front of qualitative adjectives. The other way in which we can
indicate the amount of quality is by using a comparative or a
superlative.
 Classifying adjectives identify someone or something as a member
of a class; for instance: financial, intellectual. As we shall see, some
adjectives can be both qualitative and classifying. For example: in
an emotional person, “emotional” is a qualitative adjective meaning
“feeling or expressing strong emotions”, it has a comparative and a
superlative and it can be used with submodifiers. Thus, a person can
be very emotional, rather emotional or more emotional than
someone else. However, in the emotional needs of children,
“emotional“ is a classifying adjective meaning “relating to a person’s
emotions”, and so it cannot be submodified. Other examples are:
academic, secret, late, extreme, moral, objective, dry, ordinary,
educational, rural…

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 Colour adjectives are a small group of adjectives which identify

colour of something: blue, green.
 Emphasizing adjectives are a small group of adjectives used to
emphasize your feeling about the person or thing you are talking
about. For example: complete, absolute, utter.
 Postdeterminers are adjectives used in a similar way to
determiners to make the reference more precise. Their place in a
noun group is immediately after the determiner, if there is one, and
before any other adjectives.
 -Ing adjectives, which are related to the present participle of a
verb. One group of these adjectives describes the effect that
something has on our feelings and ideas, or on the feelings and
ideas of people in general: a war welcoming smile. These adjectives
are normally qualitative adjectives. This means that they can be
used with a modifier, and have comparatives and superlatives. In
addition, they can be used in attributive or predicative position: a
very convincing opinion; the present situation is terrifying.
When these –ing adjectives are used to describe a process or state
that continues over a period of time, they are classifying
adjectives and have related intransitive verbs: rapidly rising
productivity. These –ing adjectives are only used attributively, so
when the –ing forms of intransitive verbs appear after the verb “be”,
they are actually part of a continuous tense.
 -Ed adjectives are also a large number of adjectives ending in –ed,
and which are related to the past participle of the verb; and others
are formed by adding –ed to a noun. Most –ed adjectives related to
a verb have a passive meaning: A known criminal is a criminal who
is known by the police.
-Ed adjectives that refer to a person’s mental or emotional reaction
to something are generally qualitative: he was a worried old man,
a bored old woman… These adjectives can be submodified, just like
other qualitative adjectives.

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 TOPIC 14 - Expresión de la cualidad. Expresión de grado y comparación

 Compound adjectives are made up of two or more words, usually

written with hyphens between them. They may be qualitative,
classifying, or colour adjectives: I was in a light-hearted mood. The
forming of a compound adjective is a productive feature of English.
These are the most common and least restricted patterns for
forming compound adjectives:
adjective or number plus noun plus –ed: one-sided
adjective or adverb plus past participle: low-paid
adjective, adverb or noun plus present participle: good-looking
These are less common and more restricted patterns for forming
compound adjectives:
noun plus past participle: tongue-tied
noun plus adjective: trouble-free
adjective plus noun: present-day
past participle plus adverb: rundown
number plus singular count noun: five-page

2. ADJECTIVAL CLAUSES

Another way of expressing quality is by using an adjectival clause, a

clause that functions as an adjective. The position of this clause is
immediately after the noun it qualifies which is called antecedent. This
clause falls into several groups:
a) Appositive clauses introduced by ”that”:
The fact that he wrote a letter to her is well known.
b) clauses introduced by “as”:
We had such grapes as you never saw.
c) clauses introduced by “but”:
There is no man here but would like to be in your place.
d) clauses with the present or past participle and sometimes the
infinitive:
The man waiting for me outside is my friend George.

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 TOPIC 14 - Expresión de la cualidad. Expresión de grado y comparación

The apple tree, swaying gently in the breeze, had good crop.
e) Verbless clause which consists of an adjective functioning as a full
clause:
The man, nervous, opened the letter.

3. DIFFERENT AMOUNTS OF QUALITY: DEGREE

When we want to indicate something more about the quality which an

adjective describes we can use a submodifier such as very with it. We do
this in order to indicate the amount of the quality or to intensify it. Many
submodifiers are adverbs of degree. We use them more with qualitative
adjectives than with other types of adjectives: an extremely narrow road;
a rather clumsy person. We can also use them with classifying and colour
adjectives.
We can classify submodifiers according to their meaning:
 Intensifying qualitative adjectives: extremely, surprisingly,
dreadfully, incredibly, really, very, highly, so…
She was really nice.
 Reducing qualitative adjectives: faintly, moderately, rather,
somewhat, fairly, quite…
It’s a fairly common feeling.
She was quite tall.
 Indicating extent: almost, nearly, fully, roughly, partly, mainly,
predominantly…
It was an almost automatic reflex
 Indicating sufficiency: adequately, sufficiently, acceptably, enough…
The roof is adequately insulated.
A girl in a factory wasn’t good enough for him.
 Indicating insufficiently: inadequately, insufficiently and
unacceptably.
Their publications were inadequately researched.
 Indicating excess: too, excessively, overly and the prefix over-
My feet are too big.

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 TOPIC 14 - Expresión de la cualidad. Expresión de grado y comparación

They were overly eager.

An intellectual but overcautious man.

4. COMPARING THINGS

When we want to indicate the amount of quality that something or

someone has, we can use comparative and superlative adjectives.
However, we can also express this meaning by using a submodifier with
an adjective, indicating at the same time the concept of degree.

4.1 COMPARATIVE

We can describe something by saying that it has more of a quality than

something else. We do this by using comparative adjectives. Only
qualitative adjectives have comparatives, but a few colour adjectives also
have them.
In general, in order to form the comparative of an adjective, we add –er
to the adjective or we place more in front of it. We add –er to
monosyllables (dark, darker); two-syllable adjectives ending in: a vocalic
sound: (narrow, narrower; pretty; prettier; clever, cleverer); syllabic “l”:
(simple, simpler); words ending in -ly: silly, sillier; or words having stress
on the last syllable: polite, politer.
More is used with all longer adjective, especially if ending in a hard group
of consonants: ridiculous, more ridiculous; it is also used with two-
syllables adjectives ending in full and re: doubtful, more doubtful.
Sometimes a spelling change is necessary when forming the comparative
form:
For example, in adjectives ending in a single vowel followed by a single
consonant, the final consonant is doubled: fat, fatter. Adjectives ending in
mute –e, add –r: brave, braver. And two-syllable adjectives ending in –y
change to –ier: pretty, prettier.
There are also irregular comparatives of adjectives: good, better; bad,
worse; old, older, elder; little, less, lesser; much/many, more; far,
farther, further.

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 TOPIC 14 - Expresión de la cualidad. Expresión de grado y comparación

When we want to show inferiority, we use less…than: He is less clever

than Mike

Comparatives can be used as modifiers in front of a noun: a harder

mattress often helps with back injuries. They can also be used as
complements after a link verb: we need to be more flexible.
Comparatives are often followed by than when we want to specify what
the other thing involved in the comparison is. For instance: …an area
bigger than Great Britain¸ He’s taller than I am.

4.2 SUPERLATIVE

Another way of describing something is to say that it has more of a quality

than anything else of its kind. We do this by using a superlative adjective.
Only qualitative adjectives usually have superlatives, but a few colour
adjectives also have them.
Superlatives normally consist of either –est added to the end of the
adjective and the placed in front of it, or the most placed in front of the
adjective. The same changes applied to adjectives in order to form the
comparative form, are used for superlatives. However, we add –est
instead of –er: narrow, narrowest; clever, cleverest; simple, simplest;
silly, silliest, polite, politest.
With longer adjectives we use most: ridiculous, most ridiculous. As well as
with two-syllable adjectives ending in full and re: doubtful, most doubtful.
As in comparatives, in adjectives ending in a single vowel followed by a
single consonant, the final consonant is doubled: fat, fattest. Adjectives
ending in mute –e, add –st: brave, bravest. And two-syllable adjectives
ending in –y change to –iest: pretty, prettiest.
There are also irregular comparatives of adjectives: good, best; bad,
worst; old, oldest, eldest; little, least; much/many, most; far, furthest,
farthest.
With superlatives, we use the least + adj to show a minimum degree: He
is the least clever.

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Superlatives can be used as modifiers in front of a noun: It was the most

exciting summer of their lives. It can also be used as complement: he
was the youngest. Sometimes we use a qualifying phrase or clause
consisting of a prepositional phrase normally beginning with in or of:
These cakes are probably the best in the world.

4.3 SIMILARITY

Another way of describing things is by saying that something is similar in

some way to something else.
If we want to say that a person or a thing has as much of a quality as
something of someone else we can use a structure based on the word as
in front of a qualitative adjective. Usually this adjective is the followed by
a qualifying phrase or clause which also begins with as:
The village garden’s aren’t as good as they used to be.
John was not as clever as her.
If something has similar qualities of features to something else, instead of
using the as…as structure, we can say that the first thing is like the
second one. We do this by using prepositional phrases beginning with like
after link verbs:
The whole thing is like a bad dream.
It sounded like a fine idea.
If we want to say that one thing is exactly like something else, we can say
that it is the same as the other thing. This structure can be followed by a
noun group, a pronoun, an adjunct or a clause:
Her colouring was the same as mine.
They both taste the same.
Alike, comparable, equivalent, identical, similar can also be used to say
that two or more things are like each other. We can put the preposition to
after all them except alike in order to mention the second of the things
being compared:
They all looked alike.

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Flemish is similar to Afrikaans.

CONCLUSION

Being able to express qualities is basic for efficient and fluid

communication. Adjectives are a fundamental part within the expression
of qualities, for they are used all the time in everyday and ordinary
conversations. It is why adjectives are absolutely important to be learned
by students, specially comparatives, superlatives and even adjective
order, as well as adjectival clauses or other similar constructions, so that
they can properly express qualities.

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