Adjectives are words that characterise what is being described. They teach us about nouns and provide us with further understanding about them. The term “tall,” for example, describes a person and informs us that that person is tall. An adjective paints a clearer picture of the other characteristics of a noun. Similarly an adjective describing a proper noun is simply termed as a proper adjective.
About Proper Adjectives
Adjectives that describe a proper noun or pronoun are known as proper adjectives. They must correspond in quantity, gender, and other describing metrics of quantities. If the adjective is modifying more than one noun or pronoun, case with the noun or pronoun they are describing it can be characterised as a proper adjective. In the line “The boy, who was wearing a blue shirt, leaped from the bridge,” the adjective “appropriate” modifies the singular noun “boy,” therefore the adjective must coincide in form with the noun it modifies. Because the property of an adjective is multiple, it must be changed with a plural noun or pronoun.
Uses of Proper Adjectives
A modified form of the adjective, which focuses on characterising and describing the proper nouns instead of common nouns. Common nouns are normal places, names, things, etc. To claim a noun proper, it should specify an entity and add additional information about it. An example, stating the difference between common and proper noun is stated below-
In the sentence “ I live in a city in England” ,
“England” is a proper noun and “city” is a common noun.
The proper adjective describes the related attributes of a proper noun, same as how an adjective describes the related attributes of a common noun. The proper adjective added with any figure of speech in verbal English is important in situations requiring formal conversations.
It is important to note that proper adjectives are the succeeding derivations of proper nouns. A proper adjective. When a proper adjective is used in written English, it is mandatory that the first letter of the proper adjective is a capital letter. Let us review some proper adjective examples sentences.
- “The Indian flag possesses three colours, Saffron, White and Green.”
In the above sentence the proper adjective is “Indian” and the name of the colours “Saffron, White and Green” are a proper noun, name of the colours when they don’t describe any entity of a part of speech they can also be classified as a common noun. Names of the colours in the above sentence can also be classified as an adjective since they describe an attribute of a noun (which is the colour of the flag).
- “Citizens of America are called Americans.”
In the above sentence the proper noun is the word “America” and the proper adjective describing the proper noun is the word “American”.
- “Italian pasta is famous in the New York city.”
In the above sentence the proper noun is the word “New York city” and the proper adjective describing an attribute of the proper noun is the word “Italian”.
- “Marie likes the Belgian chocolate ice-cream flavour.”
It is a common mistake to confuse the name of a person for a common noun, name of any specific thing or a person is a proper noun, thus the proper noun in the above sentence is the name “Marie” and the proper adjective relating an attribute to the proper noun is the word “Belgian”.
- “The people of Ireland predominantly speak Irish.”
In the above sentence the proper noun is the name of a specific country “Ireland” and the proper adjective describing the attribute of the proper noun is the word “Irish”.
Proper adjectives, in written English are the most succinct method to express a notion. They are simply adjectives that have been reduced to their most basic meaning. The greatest place to employ an appropriate adjective in writing is in place of a lengthier, more descriptive adjective. This not only saves words, but it also informs your reader precisely how you feel about something without the need of a huge phrase that may not adequately convey your views.
The most useful technique to transform a proper noun to a proper adjective is to add the suffix – ian, and/or an.
Conclusion
Proper adjectives are adjectives that describe a proper noun. They are used to give more information about a proper noun and to add to the meaning of a sentence. For example, in the sentence, “The old man harvested the Himalayan apple from the tree,” the word “Himalayan” is a proper adjective. However, in the sentence, “The old man, named John, harvested the Himalayan apple from the tree,” the name “John” is a proper noun because it adds information about a person and says something about that person. A proper adjective is derived from the use of proper nouns. Just as how the first letter of a noun or a proper noun is always capital, the first letter of the proper adjective should be in capitals.