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Anonymous Posted 11 years ago
Grammar
a distinction re: adjectives
I'm hoping I can get help identifying a distinction in adjectives: those that pertain directly to the noun they modify, vs. those that describe the effect of the noun on something or somebody else.
Some examples:
in "A lucky man," the man himself is lucky. In "A lucky break," the break is lucky not to itself (as it were), but lucky to a person.
In "A proud mother," the mother herself is proud. In "a proud victory," the victory isn't itself proud (as it were), rather somebody is proud of it.
What I'm looking for is an easy way to capture this distinction between an adjective that directly (as it were) modifies its noun and one that describes how somebody else views or experiences it.
Would you call the former "intransitive adjectives" and the latter "transitive adjectives" (because their description implicitly fits not the mentioned noun but implicitly something/somebody else)?
Thanks!
Some examples:
in "A lucky man," the man himself is lucky. In "A lucky break," the break is lucky not to itself (as it were), but lucky to a person.
In "A proud mother," the mother herself is proud. In "a proud victory," the victory isn't itself proud (as it were), rather somebody is proud of it.
What I'm looking for is an easy way to capture this distinction between an adjective that directly (as it were) modifies its noun and one that describes how somebody else views or experiences it.
Would you call the former "intransitive adjectives" and the latter "transitive adjectives" (because their description implicitly fits not the mentioned noun but implicitly something/somebody else)?
Thanks!
Top answer
Anonymous n "A lucky man," the man himself is lucky. In "A proud mother," the mother herself is proud. In "a proud victory," the victory isn't itself proud (as it were), rather somebody is proud of it.
- Anonymous n "A lucky man," the man himself is lucky.
- In "A proud mother," the mother herself is proud.
- In "a proud victory," the victory isn't itself proud (as it were), rather somebody is proud of it.
- In both of those, the concept is that both the man and the break are imbued with luck and that both the mother and the victory are imbued with pride.
- Anonymous What I'm looking for is an easy way to capture this distinction between an adjective that directly (as it were) modifies its noun and one that describes how somebody else views or experiences it.
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3 Answers
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Anonymousn "A lucky man," the man himself is lucky. In "A lucky break," the break is lucky not to itself (as it were), but lucky to a person.In "A proud mother," the mother herself is proud. In "a proud victory," the victory isn't itself proud (as it were), rather somebody is proud of it.In both of those, the concept is that both the man and the break are imb
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AnonymousWould you call the former "intransitive adjectives" and the latter "transitive adjectives"No, because there is already terminology for these. "inherent adjectives" and "non-inherent adjectives".
See http://www.ucl.ac.uk/internet-grammar/adje
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Thank you both. The terminology inherent and non-inherent adjectives helps, as does the observation about semantics.
Yes, "imbued with" covers both senses, though it's a bit of trade-off, i.e. accepting increased semantic ambiguity for coverage. But it makes sense to say the distinction finally comes down to definitions. "Proud" means both having the emotion pride and occasioning it. A pr
Yes, "imbued with" covers both senses, though it's a bit of trade-off, i.e. accepting increased semantic ambiguity for coverage. But it makes sense to say the distinction finally comes down to definitions. "Proud" means both having the emotion pride and occasioning it. A pr
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