Questions tagged [compound-adjectives]
A compound adjective is when two or more adjectives are combined to modify a noun. In many instances, such compounds are hyphenated.
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Why does the sequence of some types of adjectives differ?
I was reading a book, and a character calls another character "a gangly, little human". Now, if I were to use another adjective instead of little, say, tiny, I would have to say "a tiny,...
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Seem small clause
It is said that the omission of "to be" is allowed only when the adjective (phrases), noun (phrases), or prepositional phrase comes after the to be like this:
a He seemed (to be) angry about the ...
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Is "urban-rural gap" a proper English term for a disparity between urban and rural areas or just a word-for-word translation from Chinese?
I came across this phrase when I was reading a research paper. Here's a quote from the abstract:
I find that the urban-rural gap accounts for 40% of mean country inequality and much of its cross-...
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Should there be a hyphen in expressions such as "currently-available X"?
My natural instinct is to hyphenate expressions such as "currently-available", "currently-implemented", etc., when they modify a noun. Example: "the currently-available version of X". It seems to me ...
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When can compound adjectives be plural? [duplicate]
I am helping to correct some errors in a game manual not originally written in english. I've come across a bit that I'm not sure what to do with.
The game consists of several 90-minute matches.
My ...
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Why does the adjective "suitable" come after "hands-on activities"?
Please clarify the grammar used in the sentence below.
Most museums provide hands-on activities suitable for both children and adults.
Question: Why is the adjective "suitable for" placed after ...
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Is "currently-installed" a proper compound adjective? [duplicate]
I'm in the process of working on technical documentation and the phrase "currently-installed" came up. The context of the orginal sentesnece is as follows:
"You are not licensed to use the ...
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Adjectives used with intransitive verbs in lieu of adverbs
I certainly wouldn't argue that "I feel good" should be replaced with "I feel well," but I have forgotten what we used to call the adjective in this type of construction. Adjective predicate? ...
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hyphenation of compound adjectives [closed]
Proofreading a friend's work, I came across the following phrase:
[teachers and students] work collaboratively to change long held, potentially incorrect and deeply believed views
Now, while I'm ...
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Is there any adjective for describing a person who prefers his/her friends to his/her family?
I'm looking for an adjective /idiom /expression /phrase with a negative connotation, for describing someone who spends their time mostly with their friends, and prefer their friends to their own ...
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Looking for a specific synonym of "selfish" [duplicate]
A word or phrase that describes best a specific type of person or their behavior. The type of person that would not act upon a threat if said threat is not affecting their personal well-being directly....
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Do AmE and BrE dictionaries treat compound adjectives differently?
My (BrE) OED and (AmE) dictionary.com both list the adjective 'middle-class' with a hyphen.
The OED provides these examples:
a middle-class attitude
The magazine is very middle-class.
The (AmE)...
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Syntax of "two-letter word," "five-mile run," "three-hour play"?
Araucaria's answer to the following ELL question ("Why is “letter” not plural in “two letter words”?") brought up an interesting issue that I am still unsure about. What is the internal syntactic ...
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hyphenation of adjective phrases [duplicate]
Should adjectival phrases that are hyphenated when they modify a noun, e.g. a case-sensitive password, be hyphenated when they are predicate adjectives, e.g. The password is case-sensitive?
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Hyphenation in "first century AD" etc as an adjective
I edit a lot of articles that contain phrases such as "A first century AD inscription..." or "First century BC writer Herodotus..." I know that a compound adjective before a noun is usually hyphenated,...
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Word or phrase used to describe someone who controls someone else through possessions or financial means
Not sure if such a phrase or word to describe a person/actions actually exists. Have been using “to lord something over someone,” but this might not be the correct usage.
ex1: If someone pays for a ...
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Hyphen usage with expressions in compound adjectives
Compound adjectives are hyphenated, e.g. "data-to-field binding". But how is the hyphen used when one of the words in the compound adjective is an expression? For example, how would you hyphenate the ...
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What does 'removed from' mean when it's used with some type of material?
The following is a quote from the computer science classic, "The Mythical Man-Month" (1975).
Finally, there is the delight of working in such a tractable medium. The programmer, like the poet, ...
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Commas with multiple compound adjectives
When adding commas between adjectives, I usually ask myself the following questions:
Can I swap the adjectives and still get the same meaning?
Can I add the word "and" between the two adjectives and ...
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Why are nouns in counting adjectival phrases singular?
Basically, why is it:
"two-item plate"
"three-person table"
"two-man race"
I was trying to find a rule (or a style guide reference or something) that I could pass on to a friend that explains why ...
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Use of apostrophe in adjective phrase containing a possessive
I work and write for a tech company that has created many first-in-the-world technologies. In press releases, I often write something like “[Company name] today announced another world’s first with ...
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"Two separate nouns + based" as the attribute?
In scientific writing, it is correct to write something like
The filter-based method is good.
But what if I have two nouns before -based? Something like
The lowpass filter-based method is good.
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What is the equivalent of a "Good Watch" for an audiobook or record?
We say that a movie is a "good watch" and a book is a "good read".
Somehow, to say that an audiobook or an album is a "good listen" doesn't sound right to my ears, but perhaps that's only because I'...
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Is "dead" possible before any adjective?
I've seen combinations like "dead serious", "dead gorgeous" and...
Is it possible to have "dead" before any other adjective(s)? Such as dead difficult or dead stupid? If not, how can one know which ...
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“It is happy for me to ....” and “It is glad for me to....”
Okay, so my students in Japan keep using
“it is happy for me to…” “…it is glad for me to…”
I know it is incorrect and the words happy and glad can be changed with others to make some ...
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>2-word compound modifiers and suspended hyphens
I have been taught that when creating compound modifiers, a hyphen (-) should be used if the compound consists of two words, while an en-dash (–) is used if the compound consists of three or more ...
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Use of -esque in compound-adjective phrases
I know the suffix '-esque' can be used in the following situations:
Ever since he showed up on the music scene as a marvelously talented teenager, there’s been a hint of Sinatra-esque swagger ...
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What about adjective "especial" for a person?
I read about the use of especial and special. But I'm not sure if applies the same when describing a person.
For instance, do you say:
I am an especial person.
or
I am a special person.
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Quarter Asteroidal Hypocycloid, in Layman's Terms
Take a gander at the hypocycloid. You may recognize the shape from the logo of an American football team...
My question is, how do you describe the tip of one such shape in common parlance (in other ...
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Is it preferable to generally use nested prepositional phrases or a hyphenated adjectival phrase?
I've recently run into some sticky situations involving how to write out complicated concept descriptions. Take this example:
Which metrics are appropriate for evaluating the accuracy of a ...
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Relative reduced adjective phrase rephrased as Compound Adjective
Balloon filled with gas = gas-filled balloon
Infested with mosquito = mosquito-infested
Covered in/with snow = snow-covered
Necklace studded with diamonds = diamond studded
Deprived of sleep = sleep-...
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Is there a technique used when someone splits a compound noun into two parts?
My student has asked whether the splitting of the compound word keyhole into key hole is a particular literary technique. I didn't know!
It's relevant to the text, as it is about disconnection and ...
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Adjective for someone who knows their limits
I am looking for adjectives for describing a person who knows their limits, what they are capable of and what not, knows their weak and strong points.
Usage example: When you are going through a new ...
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Use of 'cum' as the interstitial in a three-word semi-comparative adjective? [duplicate]
I have occasionally encountered and often written a three-word adjective of the form 'X-cum-Y' to describe a person, where the X and Y are normally set somewhat in tension with one another, if they ...
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What do you call the side of a building that is neither the near side nor the far side?
What do you call the side of a building that is neither the near side nor the far side?
A friend suggested adjacent. I think that fits, but is there a way to distinguish between adjacent faces of a ...
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Is there any reason for saying "he is good-looking", instead of "he is well-looking"?
A person who has............is said to be..............
"good manners".........."well-mannered"
"good behaviour"........"well-behaved"
"good intentions"........"well-intentioned"
"a good ...
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What word would work as a better substitute for "Stalker"?
Context
I am working on a game and one of the Classes in it is "Rogue". (Original, I know.) I'm trying to find a term that accurately describes and can serve as a name for one of the ...
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What's a word to describe black humor of the variety that criticizes the injustices of the world?
For example, let's say I see a homeless man and woman eating scraps of food next to a garbage fire to keep warm and I say to my friend, "Must be date night" (with undertones of "This is a sad world"). ...
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Phrasal verbs as hyphenated adjectives
So I recently had a question of how to translate a seemingly simple phrase which gave rise to a really puzzling dilemma. The phrase itself was "the eye which had been operated on", it was ...
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Does this open compound noun require a hyphen when used as an adjective?
A friend of mine works at a restaurant that sells tortilla soup; however, I think the soup tastes like hot dogs. There are thus three ways to write this: hot dog soup, hot-dog soup, hotdog soup.
Only ...
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Joining two words to make a single word
I am international engineering student studying in US. I have a question regarding words that are created as a result of joining two words. Usually this happens when two technologies or methodologies ...
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Is 'a 210-million-people market' correctly written? [duplicate]
Usually I find compound adjectives quite straightforward, but I'm not so sure when it comes to the following:
A 210-million-people market
So how should I refer to a market 210 million people large ...
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What grammatical role is "blood" playing in the phrase "blood red"?
"Blood red" can be both a noun and an adjective:
Blood red is my favourite colour. [noun]
The wall was blood red. [adjective]
The "blood" is optional in the sense it can be ...
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What does 'fungus-growing' mean?
Renowned Swiss entomologist Martin Luscher described the mounds of
this fungus-growing species as being as much as 16 feet tall, 16 feet
in diameter at their base, and with a cement-like wall of ...
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Intelligent-intensive or Intelligence-intensive?
Which of the titular phrases is the most appropriate and correct to express a work or task that mainly relies on the intelligence of an entity?
Stats of matches from Google Books:
Intelligent-...
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is it "mice infested" or "mouse infested"?
You would say "rat infested" but would you say "mouse infested" or "mice infested"?
Sidenote: I think we would say "mouse infestation" so I'm assuming we would also say "louse infestation" as ...
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En dash with compound adjectives (problem)
I frequently encounter cases, such as the ones below, where you seemingly have two hyphenated compound adjectives modifying a noun. I know that in such cases that you should join the compound ...
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Could someone deconstruct this sentence and explain where it is right or wrong grammatically?
The sentence is:
I'm of the fuck covid opinion.
A friend of mine stated it and I would like to know if someone could explain why it should or should not be written differently.
user412429
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Can a compound modifier include a verb or be a sentence?
Recently, my significant other and I were sharing our reactions to an image of someone who looked much older than they actually were on social media. We were texting each other.
I captioned the ...
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definite article 'a'
The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language, pag 529, says:
Predeterminer AdjPs (e.g., such a nuisance, or so serious a problem) occur as
external modifier in NP structure, preceding the ...
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