[Grammar] Article 3 Sentence Construction

[TalonRider]

Part 4 Adjectives

• Nouns are subjects or objects, and they are described by adjectives. Adjectives can "decorate" a noun and provide significantly more information about it.
  
• Adjectives usually precede the noun unless they are being used as predicate adjectives (completers) and follow the verb.
  
• Adjectives generally describe size, shape, color, emotion, condition, position, physical attribute, or some other quality.
  
• The words a, an, and the are considered adjectives (they are usually called "articles") and always precede a noun or noun phrase.
  
• Adjectives give color and vibrance to our language by allowing us to create word pictures for our readers. We can recreate the world around us in our writing.
  
• As a general rule, if you are using a series of adjectives, you should place size or shape first, color second, position, condition, or emotion next, and other qualities last.
  

Provides limited information: secretary

Provides more information: experienced secretary, stressed-out secretary, young secretary, angry secretary, nervous secretary

Provides even more information: nervous young secretary

Adverbs

• Adverbs do all the other descriptive jobs in a sentence.
  
• Adverbs describe verbs:
  

• She thinks quickly.
  
• The new copy machine arrived promptly.
  

• Adverbs describe other adverbs:
  

• She thinks very quickly.
  
• The new copy machine arrived rather promptly.
  

• Adverbs describe adjectives:
  

• It was a very long letter.
  
• It was a quite negative report.
  

• Most adverbs are created by adding -ly to an adjective:
  

sweet -------> sweetly

scarce-------> scarcely

prompt------> promptly

rapid---------> rapidly

careful-------> carefully

• Other adverbs state how, when, where, or why:
  

afterward .................. sometimes .................... so

beforehand ............... again ............................ almost

generously ................ briefly .......................... close

never ........................ hard ............................ helpfully

rather ....................... sadly ............................ now

satisfactorily .............. seldom ......................... temporarily

soon ......................... there ............................ then

always ...................... far ................................ too

fast ........................... rarely ........................... very

here .......................... since ............................ well

 

Adjectives vs. adverb

Writers sometimes incorrectly use an adjective where they should use an adverb. Following are some common mistakes:

• Incorrect: Call us direct to receive your subscription.
  
• Correct: Call us directly to receive your subscription.
  
• Incorrect: The manager was real pleased with the result.
  
• Correct: The manager was really pleased with the result.
  
• Incorrect: She sure did a good job!
  
• Correct: She surely did a good job!
  

Caution: Bad/badly. Bad should only be used only as an adjective; the verb is badly.

He felt bad because his tooth ached badly.

 

 

Exercise - Adjectives and Adverbs

Adjective or adverb form? Circle the correct answer for each of the following.

 

1. It was a (real, really) dull convention.

 

2. Bart manages people (good, well).

 

3. Bart is a (good, well) manager.

 

4. You did a (remarkable, remarkably) job.

 

5. He finished the project (satisfactorily, satisfactory).

 

6. Remove the cap very (slow, slowly) to avoid being burned by the hot steam.

 

7. Tom was embarrassed because they performed (bad, badly).

 

8. He must act (quick, quickly) to take advantage of the discount.

 

9. Send the contract (immediate, immediately) to get the best price.

 

10. The production manager is (real, really) pleased with the current production levels.

Edited August 30, 2011 by TalonRider
To clean up coding problem.

[TalonRider]

Exercise

[glomph]

Adjectives vs. adverb

Writers sometimes incorrectly use and adjective where they should use an adverb.

 

Also, they sometimes incorrectly use and conjuction where they should use and article.

 

[*]Incorrect: Call us direct to receive your subscription.

[*]Correct: Call us directly to receive your subscription.

 

I disagree with this example. Both sentences are correct. They just mean different things.

 

"Call us direct" means not to use operator assistance (a bit obsolete, I admit). In other contexts "Call us direct" could involve admitting to being blunt.

 

"Call us directly," to Southerners at least, could likely be taken to mean that you should wait a while before you call. If I said, "I'll be back directly," I think most people would recognize what I meant, though they'd probably think I'd spent too much time back in the hills, and not enough by the cement pond in Beverly.

 

Y'all come back now. Y'hear?

 

I'm not really trying be snide, but call me too direct if you like. I'm just suggesting that the typo be corrected and that a less ambiguous adverb example be substituted. But you can wait and correct it directly. I can't correct it for you, so you'll have to do it directly anyway.

 

I do think it's great that these resources are being posted for authors and editors. Grammar and punctuation errors call attention to themselves and take away from the stories. For some reason it is very hard to proofread one's own writing and typing.

 

Perhaps when I have a little more time and after I've reviewed all these articles, I can volunteer as an editor here.

[TalonRider]

Thanks. The typo has been corrected in the original post. I guess the editor needs an editor, or a Beta Reader to check for such things.

 

Jan

[glomph]

Thanks. The typo has been corrected in the original post. I guess the editor needs an editor, or a Beta Reader to check for such things.

 

I think there must be some Natural Law that when one is making a post relating to grammar or punctuation, there will be at the very least a typo or a grammatical mistake. If spelling is under consideration, there will almost surely be a misspelling.