Page 124 - DENG101_Communication Skills-I

Unit 11: Articles, Nouns, Adjectives and Adverbs

2. We use “the” to talk about rivers, oceans and seas Notes

Examples: The Nile, The Ganges, The Indian Ocean
3. We also use “the” before certain nouns when we know there is only one of a particular
thing.

Examples: The rain, The Sun, The World, The Earth, the White House
4. We use “the” before the names of famous people when they are used as an adjective.

Examples: Sachin Tendulkar is considered as the Michal Jordan of cricket.

5. We use “the” in front of the names of the countries where they indicate multiple areas or
contain the words (state(s), kingdom, republic, union). Kingdom, state, republic and union
are nouns, so they need an article.

Examples: 1. Italy, India, England
2. The UK, The USA
3. The Netherlands, The Philippines

11.4 Adjectives

An adjective is a word that tells us something about a noun, that is, about a person, an animal, a
thing or a place.

Examples: 1. She is a pretty girl.
2. A giraffe has a long neck.

3. The table is round.
4. That is an old temple.
Adjectives can express degrees of modifi cation:

Example: Geeta is a rich woman, but Seeta is richer than Geeta, and Reeta is the richest
woman in town.
The degrees of comparison are known as the positive, the comparative, and the superlative.
(Actually, only the comparative and superlative show degrees.) We use the comparative for
comparing two things and the superlative for comparing three or more things. Notice that the
word than frequently accompanies the comparative and the word that precedes the superlative.

The infl ected suffixes -er and -est suffice to form most comparatives and superlatives, although
we need -ier and -iest when a two-syllable adjective ends in y (happier and happiest); otherwise
we use more and most when an adjective has more than one syllable.
Possessive Adjectives

A possessive adjective (“my,” “your,” “his,” “her,” “its,” “our,” “their”) is similar or identical to
a possessive pronoun; however, it is used as an adjective and modifies a noun or a noun phrase,

as in the following sentences:

Example: I can’t complete my assignment because I don’t have the textbook.

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