17 Adjectives and Adverbs

In some earlier chapters about subjects and verbs, you saw the term modifiers, and you studied how modifiers are incorporated into a simple sentence, such as in this example:

SUBJECT + VERB
The captain laughed.

SUBJECT + VERB WITH MODIFIERS (including prepositional phrases)
The longtime captain, an extremely jovial man with a flowing beard, laughed too loudly at the sophomoric joke.

In this lesson, we’ll study two categories of modifiers: adjectives and adverbs.

Adjectives modify nouns and pronouns. They typically provide information about which, what kind or how many. An adjective usually comes before the noun it modifies (as in jovial man).

Adverbs modify verbs, adjectives or other adverbs, often giving more information about when, where, how or to what extent. Many adverbs end in -ly, but a few adjectives end in -ly as well. For example, the word early can be used as an adjective or an adverb.

ADJECTIVE – The early stages of the project should be finished by December.
(The adjective early describes the noun stages.)

ADVERB – She awoke early Tuesday morning.
(The adverb early modifies the verb awoke.)

Although entire prepositional phrases may be classified as adjectives or adverbs, we won’t worry about those technical details in this lesson. Instead, we’ll look at single words that serve as adjectives and adverbs.

Here’s a different analysis of the opening example with adjectives in bold and adverbs underlined:

The longtime captain, an extremely jovial man with a flowing beard, laughed too loudly at the sophomoric joke.

And here’s the item-by-item breakdown …

The adjective longtime describes the noun captain.

The adverb extremely modifies the adjective jovial.

The adjective jovial describes the noun man.

The adjective flowing describes the noun beard.

The adverb too modifies the adverb loudly.

The adverb loudly modifies the verb laughed.

Many of our earlier chapters focused on avoiding common mistakes (AKA grammar grievances). In the case of adjectives and adverbs, though, most writers don’t make a lot of errors. For example, you may subconsciously know that any numbered word comes first in a series of adjectives, so you don’t need to memorize that concept.

UNNATURAL – French three hens
NATURAL – three French hens

Your ear probably tells you that “French three hens” just sounds wrong, while “three French hens” sounds right.

As a result, this chapter appears in the guidebook’s section on sentence structure. Analyzing a sentence for adjectives and adverbs can help you with word choice and clarity.

We studied predicate adjectives in a previous chapter about sentence patterns. An adjective usually come before the noun it modifies (as in jovial man), but that’s not always the case, as we see in a sentence that contains a predicate adjective:

Subject + Linking Verb + Predicate Adjective
Juan was happy.

You’ll often see this sentence pattern in sentences with a pronoun as the subject.

He was happy.

Or we may add prepositional phrases and other modifiers:

After the controversial game, he was surprisingly happy with the disputed result.

Next, let’s cover one intersection of punctuation and modifiers. In a previous chapter about punctuation, you saw how hyphens can be used to join some modifiers into a single idea. Here are two examples from that chapter with the hyphenated adjective in bold.

The doctor said she would take a much-needed vacation.

They stayed at a dog-friendly hotel.

Note how the hyphen in each sentence provides clarity. For example, the hyphenated dog-friendly works as a single idea to describe the hotel.

You should now be ready to practice identifying adjectives and adverbs in some sentences. In the following interactive exercise, we won’t count their as an adjective. As you learned in a previous chapter about pronouns, their is best classified as a possessive pronoun. Within a sentence, however, a possessive pronoun can serve the same function as an adjective.

In the first exercise, we’ll focus on adjectives. The sentences in this exercise are poorly written with too many descriptive words, but they work well for our practice in this chapter.

Now you can practice finding adverbs. As a reminder, the sentences in this exercise are poorly written with too many descriptive words, but they work well for our practice in this chapter.

For our purposes in learning how to identify adjectives and adverbs, I included lots of adjectives and adverbs in the exercises above. However, media writers usually limit their use of adjectives and adverbs. This makes their writing more concise and direct.

For example, here’s a crisper version of those two sentences:

Independent musicians can advance their careers with streaming services. They build a regional audience through concerts, where fans hear new songs.

Use adjectives and adverbs to provide specific information. Do NOT use adjectives and adverbs to impress others with your vocabulary skills.

VERB FORMS FOR ADJECTIVES

1. The confused guards had no explanation.
   (The word confused functions as an adjective to describe the guards.)
2. It was a confusing situation.
   (The word confusing functions as an adjective to describe the situation.)
3. The situation was confusing.
   (The word confusing is an adjective, in this case a predicate adjective as explained in the previous chapter, to describe the subject situation.)
4. The new policy confuses most employees.
   (The word confuses functions as the main verb in the sentence, with policy as the subject and employees as the direct object.)
5. The new policy is confusing most employees.
   (The verb phrase is confusing follows the subject policy and leads to the direct object employees.)

To close the chapter, here’s a brief exercise for you to eliminate unnecessary adjectives and adverbs. Keep in mind that parts of this exercise are subjective, so focus on learning instead of getting a perfect score on the exercise.