The syntactic functions of english adjectives in comparison with those of vietnamese ones

HANOI PEDAGOGICAL UNIVERSITY NO.2 FACULTY OF FOREING LANGUAGES MAI THI TRANG THE SYNTACTIC FUNCTIONS OF ENGLISH ADJECTIVES IN COMPARISON WITH THOSE OF VIETNAMESE ONES SUBMITTED IN PA

HANOI PEDAGOGICAL UNIVERSITY NO.2 FACULTY OF FOREING LANGUAGES

MAI THI TRANG

THE SYNTACTIC FUNCTIONS OF ENGLISH

ADJECTIVES IN COMPARISON WITH THOSE OF

VIETNAMESE ONES

(SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE

REQUIREMENTS OF THE DEGREE OF BARCHELOR OF ARTS IN

ENGLISH)

SUPERVISOR: NGUYEN THI MEN, M A

Hanoi, 2013

DECLARATION

I certify that this thesis is my own work and effort, it is originally written by

me under strict guidance of my supervisor The support I have received in my work and the preparation of the minor thesis itself has been acknowledged In addition, I certify that all information sources and literature used are indicated in the minor thesis’s references

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

For the completion of this paper, I have been fortunate to receive invaluable contributions from many people I would like to express my sincere thanks to my supervisor, Nguyen Thi Men, M A who step by step guides me during my writing thesis Without her assistance, excellent suggestions, expert advice and detailed critical comments, the work could not have been completed I owe her for a debt of gratitude that cannot be measured

In addition, I am greatly indebted to all my lecturers at Faculty of Foreign Languages at Hanoi Pedagogical University No.2, Vinh Phuc, for their useful lectures, support, encouragement and for inspiring me the love for English foreign language teaching and doing scientific research

Besides, the study couldn’t have been prepared without the support and the provision of useful materials from my friends Therefore, their kindness will never

be forgotten

Finally, although great efforts have been made to complete the thesis, I am aware that this study is far from perfect Hence, constructive comments are welcome for more perfection of the thesis

ABSTRACT

“Adjective” is an interesting category of English grammar It is used in many contexts to describe the characteristic, quality, shape, etc of things or people However, the use of the syntactic functions of adjectives sometimes causes learners

of English to be confused and this theme has not been adequately dealt with in some studies As a matter of fact, Vietnamese learners of English are not often totally aware of the syntactic functions of adjectives in English and in Vietnamese, too

Therefore, the research is carried out into the syntactic functions of adjectives in comparison with those in Vietnamese in the hope of providing a valuable input about the theme for Vietnamese learners of English and vice versus

so that it can partly reduce the barriers in the learning process of English to Vietnamese learners and of Vietnamese to English-native-speaking learners Moreover, the researcher hopes to fill the gap in the research field

Based on results of the comparison, the similarities and differences have been found Teaching implications for the theme of adjectives have been suggested

Subject complement Object complement Finite clause

Non-finite clause Noun phrase Object

Subject Verb

TABLE OF CONTENTS

DECLARATION i

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii

ABSTRACT iii

ABBREVATION iv

TABLE OF CONTENTS v

PART ONE INTRODUCTION 1 Rationale 1

2 Research presupposition 2

3 Research scope 2

4 Research objectives 3

5 Research tasks 3

6 Research methods 3

7 Significance of the proposed research 4

8 Design of the research work 4

PART TWO DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER I: THEORICAL BACKGROUND 1 Literature review in brief 5

2 Definitions of adjectives 10

3 Characteristics of adjectives 11

3.1 Adjectives in English 11

3.1.1 Classification 11

3.1.1.1 Based on meaning 12

3.1.1.1.1 Demonstrative 12

3.1.1.1 2 Distributive 12

3.1.1.1 3 Quantitative 12

3.1.1.1 4 Interrogative 13

3.1.1.1 5 Possessive 13

3.1.1.1 6 Quality 13

3.1.1.2 Based on the ground of the complexity of the structure 14

3.1.1.2.1 Short adjectives 14

3.1.1.2.2 Long adjectives 14

3.1.1.2.3 Special adjectives 14

3.1.2 Position of adjectives 15

3.2 Adjectives in Vietnamese 16

3.2.1 Classification 16

3.2.1.1 Based on general meaning and ability of adjectives to combine with adjuncts of degree 16

3.2.1.1.1 Non-gradable adjectives 16

3.2.1.1.1 Gradable adjectives 18

3.2.1.2 Based on the semantics and ability of adjectives to control adjuncts after the adjectives 19

3.2.1.2.1 Adjectives of external features of things 19

3.2.1.2.2 Adjectives of internal characteristics and states of things 20

3.2.2 Position of adjectives 21

3.2.2.1 After noun and verbs 21

3.2.2.2 Before nouns 22

4 Syntactic functions of adjectives 23

4.1 Definitions of syntactic function 23

4.2 Syntactic functions of adjectives in English 24

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4.2.1 Attributive 24

4.2.2 Predicative with “be” and copular verbs 26

4.2.3 Postposition 29

4.2.4 Head of noun phrases (the + adjective) 31

4.2.5 Verbless adjective clause 32

4.3 Syntactic functions of adjectives in Vietnamese 32

4.3.1 Predicate (Adjective placed after right the subject) 33

4.3.2 Modifier to both the nouns and verbs 34

4.3.3 Adverbial phrase 35

4.3.4 Subject of a sentence 36

4.3.5 Preposition 37

Chapter II: SYNTACTIC FUNCTIONS OF ENGLISH ADJECTIVES IN COMPARISON WITH THOSE OF VIETNAMESE ONES 1 Similarities 38

1.1 Adjectives function as attributive 38

1.2 Adjectives in English and in Vietnamese function as verbless adjective clause 40

1.3 Adjectives in both languages can be placed in the position of subject or object when they become a head of a noun phrase 42

2 Differences 43

2.1 English adjectives tend to appear more in pre-position, while Vietnamese ones mainly come in postposition 44

2.2 When functioning as predicative, English adjectives must appear after copular verbs or the verb “be”, whereas Vietnamese adjectives can be direct predicative 46 2.3 Vietnamese adjectives can modify verbs in the predicative

which are similar to adverbs modifying the verbs in English, but

English ones cannot 47 2.4 Some English adjectives only get the syntactic function of

predicative, but Vietnamese ones do not have it 50 2.5 Some English adjectives only function as attributive, but

Vietnamese ones do not 51 2.6 Most of the English adjectives become the head of a noun phrase

by adding or reducing the suffixes except the case of combining with

the definite article “the”, while the Vietnamese adjectives can go

with adjuncts without changing their form 52

3 Major findings and recommendations 53

PART III CONCLUSION

1 Conclusion 55

2 Implications for teaching 57

3 Recommendations for further researchers 58 REFERENCES

PART ONE INTRODUCTION

1 RATIONALE

Language is very important means of communication in daily human life Human beings use language, both in written and spoken forms, to express their ideas In a wider scope, language functions as means of international communication In a smaller group whose members share the same language, for instance, there are likely to be no difficulties in using the language since the people involving in the process of communication are used to speaking their own native language On the other hand, if people taking part in the conversation speak different languages, they might face difficulties or obstacles in getting along with each other One of the problems causing the difficulties is the language used Accordingly, they need a language which is understood by sides, the speaker and his or her counterpart This will occur when speakers are different from background: nationality, race, and language, etc In this case, an international language is really in need, especially the one that is the most widely spoken in the world Such a language is English

In Vietnam as well as in other countries, there is a greater and greater need to learn English, from young to old, and from male to female No one can deny the importance of English in Vietnam at present Therefore, English is taught at every educational level

However, learning a language is difficult because each language has its own system which is different from that in the learner’s native language The differences

in systems of language may bring about problems for foreign language learners Hence, it is inevitable that in learning English as a foreign language Vietnamese students usually have problems on account of the differences between Vietnamese and the target language It is true that English grammar is complex and often causes

embarrassment to students The adjective is one of the language categories that all learners of English have to learn much In every English skills, students usually use adjectives with a high frequency since it is one of the important complements of one sentence However, many students confess that the adjective is one of the problems of English grammar that they are vague about and often make mistakes in the use Besides, they find it difficult to distinguish the syntactic functions of adjectives in English from those in Vietnamese

In addition, as a prospective teacher, I would like to make contribution to the English teaching in Vietnam For all these reasons, this study is conducted, which focuses on the syntactic functions of adjectives in English in comparison with those

in Vietnamese

2 RESEARCH SUPPOSITION

Some questions are raised:

a) What are the syntactic functions of adjectives in Vietnamese?

b) What are the syntactic functions of adjectives in English?

c) What are the similarities and differences between the syntactic functions of adjectives in English and those in Vietnamese?

Based on the questions above, I am eager to learn about the problems and make a comparison analysis between English adjectives and Vietnamese ones so that the major similarities and differences may be found

3 RESEARCH SCOPE

The general research area of this study is grammar

The phenomenon is the syntactic functions of adjectives in English in comparison with those in Vietnamese Others relating to the functions of adjectives are also briefly mentioned

4 RESEARCH OBJECTIVES

The thesis is to be focused on:

a) The syntactic functions of English adjectives and Vietnamese ones

The study involves fulfilling the following tasks:

a) To study the classifications, the positions, and the syntactic functions of adjectives in English

b) To study the classifications, the positions, and the syntactic functions of adjectives in Vietnamese

c) To compare the syntactic functions of adjectives in English with those in Vietnamese On the basic of the findings teaching implications to this category are recommended

6 RESEARCH METHODS

To achieve the objectives of the study, the following methods have been applied:

a) Quantitative

- Collecting the materials and references

- Consulting the supervisor, experienced teachers and friends

- Synthesizing theoretical documents on English and Vietnamese grammar b) Descriptive

Giving the theoretical background of the adjectives and the syntactic functions of the adjectives in the two languages

c) Comparison

Comparing the syntactic functions of adjectives in English with those in Vietnamese ones based on the materials’ analysis and the researcher’s own knowledge

7 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE PROPOSED RESEARCH

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The syntactic function category in the two languages always has similarities and differences It will get mislead for learners if they cannot distinguish the differences in the classification, the position, the functions, and even the formation

of that category It is, therefore, essential for teachers to have better solutions to limit the misleading After the research, it is hoped that the result will be helpful to provide:

a) Input for Vietnamese learners of English about different aspects of adjectives especially their syntactic functions

b) Input for foreign learners of Vietnamese about different aspects of adjectives especially their syntactic functions

c) Input for teachers of English with teaching implications

This study is also beneficial to anyone who is interested in adjectives in English

8 DESIGN OF THE RESEARCH WORK

The research work has three main parts, namely: Introduction, Development,

and Conclusion The part Development includes two chapters Chapter one is entitled Theoretical Background that deals with things related to the adjectives such

as literature review in brief, definition, classification, position, and the syntactic

functions

Chapter two is named The Syntactic Functions of Adjectives in English in

Comparison with those in Vietnamese, which has three sections Section one

provides the definition of syntactic functions of adjectives The second one deals with the similarities The last one focuses on the differences

PART TWO DEVELOPMENT

CHAPTER I: THEORICAL BACKROUND

1 Literature review in brief

Adjectives are very familiar to us in language use They make our life more colorful and language more beautiful However, basing on their syntactic functions adjectives are used differently in different languages, and so are adjectives in English and in Vietnamese There are a great number of Vietnamese and Foreign grammarians doing studies on adjectives and their syntactic functions such as S Greenbaum (1973), Geoffrey (1989), Eastwood (1999), Side and Wellman (1999), Nguyen Huu Quynh (1980), Le Bien (1999), Dinh Van Duc (2001), Hoang Thung, et.al (2003), Nguyen Van Thanh (2003), Diep Quang Ban (2005), etc They have their own way to describe adjectives Generally, they focus their attention on the definition, classification, position, order and formation of adjectives About syntactic functions of adjectives, almost grammarians mention their functions as predicative and attributive

R Quirk and S Greenbaum who are the authors of A University Grammar of

English (1973) give a general picture of the syntactic functions of adjectives in

English They pay much attention to five aspects like attributive, predicative, as a head of noun, verbless clause, and exclamatory adjective sentence Besides, they

also describe such characteristics of the adjectives as modifying nouns, taking comparative and superlative forms Basing on the functions of the adjectives, the authors divide the adjectives into attributive and predicative only Next basing on their meanings, the grammarians classify them into three pairs such as stative and dynamic, gradable and non-gradable, inherent and non-inherent Finally, they mention the order of the adjectives R Quirk and S Greenbaum provide a complete view on the English adjectives, especially their syntactic functions

A Communicative Grammar of English (1989) written by G Leech and J

Svartvik shows the syntactic functions of the adjectives in attributive and predicative, then the adjectives function as a head of a noun phrase They carefully and clearly describe them in common and particular usages Besides, the two authors also give explanations and examples for comparative and superlative adjectives Thus, Leech and Svartvik only concentrate on some characteristics of adjectives and make them remarkable They are different from the others when mentioning the function of adjective as a head of a noun phrase by taking the determiners

In Collin Cobuild English Grammar (1990) William Collin Sons deal with

the types of adjectives including qualitative, classifying, color, emphasizing, and determiners Moreover, he gives more descriptions of comparative, “ing” form, “-ed” form and compound adjectives The functions of adjectives as attributive and predicative are found in his book

To illustrate the adjectives in English, the grammarians in National Literacy Secretariat of Human Resources Development Canada concentrate on the

definition, classification, position, and function of the adjectives in Academic

Studies English Grammar (1998) For the classification, the authors only remark

the use of demonstrative Then they add one more syntactic function of adjectives that is verbless clause Nevertheless, it is better when they mention three syntactic functions of the adjectives

In Grammar Practice for Upper Intermediate Students (1999), E Walker

and S Ellsworth provide a general picture of adjectives in English They concentrate on position, function, order and formation of adjective For position of adjective, they indicate that when adjective comes before a noun it is attributive and it is predicative when coming after a copular verb For function of adjective, they show the function of attributive and predicative However, for the formation of adjective in English they only pay attention to particles as adjectives Walker and Ellsworth also mention comparison of adjectives with some expressions used for positive, comparative, and superlative comparison One thing different in their study is that they give definition and using of non-gradable adjectives Two grammarians represent a lot of specific information about adjectives in English

In Grammar and Vocabulary for Cambridge Advanced and Proficiency

(1999), G Side and G Wellman deal with position of adjective with specific examples Then they prove that some adjectives can be used in both positions In conclusion, their study on adjectives is narrower than others’

M Swan and C Walter who wrote The Good Grammar Book (2002) point

out some characteristics of English adjectives like their definition, comparison and position But the authors do not explain more about the syntactic functions of adjectives Basing on the position in relation to nouns and copular verbs, they function as attributive and predicative

According to Advanced Learners’ Grammar (2003) written by M Foley and

D Hall, the adjectives used before nouns function as attributive and those placed after linking verbs function as predicative Unlike the above grammarians, they focus on functions and positions of the adjectives; classify them into predicative and attributive adjectives

Likewise Advanced Learners’ Grammar, Hewing in Advanced Grammar in

Use (2005) presents adjectives in their functions and positions It is more specific

when he pays much attention to how to use gradable and non-gradable adjectives Hence, these grammarians have no new ideas on the syntactic functions

Ruth Colman in The Briefest English Grammar Ever (2005) refers to

definition and function of adjectives in English He wrote that the adjectives are formed from nouns and verbs His study has a lot of ideas which concentrate on demonstrative and comparison of adjective However, they are not as specific as others’

Unlike foreign grammarians that only conduct researches on the English adjectives, some Vietnamese ones compare Vietnamese adjectives to the adjectives

in European languages to emphasize them Ngữ pháp Tiếng Việt Từ loại (2001)

written by Dinh Van Duc explains the adjectives in this way He points out that the position of Vietnamese adjectives is different from those in English and Russian The adjectives in Vietnamese come after nouns but those in European languages are placed before nouns In that book, he mainly makes comparison between the syntactic functions of Vietnamese adjectives and those in European languages

In Từ Loại Tiếng Việt (2002), Le Bien particularly describes adjectives in

Vietnamese He defines adjective as a type of word having positive ability to create other words Next, he gives grammatical functions of adjective with attributive, predicative, subject and combination to different types of word Lastly, he points out that there are two types of adjective: relative adjectives and strict adjectives

When describing Vietnamese adjectives, Nguyen Van Thanh in Tiếng Việt

Hiện Đại (2003) collects the definitions of the adjectives by many Vietnamese

grammarians and from his view He classifies the adjectives into nine types as following: quality, color, characteristic, temperature, state, gender, relationship In addition, he presents the comparison of Vietnamese adjectives with the three levels the same as English ones And the most important is that he indicates that the adjectives have three functions of attributive, predicative, and subject (as a head of

a noun phrase) in comparison with those in European languages Therefore,

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Nguyen Van Thanh is only different from others in classification of the adjectives and the way he shows the characteristics of Vitenamese adjectives in comparison with those in European languages

Diep Quang Ban in Ngữ Pháp Tiếng Việt (2005) begins his study with

definition of adjective and emphasizes the functions of main components in a phrase He classifies Vietnamese adjectives into two kinds that are quality adjectives and relative adjectives A new thing in his study is distinguishing between adjectives and verbs relating to state of mind To sum up, Diep Quang Ban focuses much on the classification of adjectives

With Ngữ Pháp Tiếng Việt (2009) written by Nguyen Ly Kha, the features of

adjectives are described in detail Firstly, she defines Vietnamese adjectives as a major part of speech denoting quality of nouns Then she shows their ability to combine with adjuncts Different from Nguyen Van Thanh, she classifies the adjectives into two types: gradable and non-gradable For the function, she presents

it so clearly and completely According to her, Vietnamese adjectives are used as attributive, predicative, subject and verbless clause (adverbial)

We would have a comprehensive view on adjectives in Vietnamese with

Cẩm Nang Ngữ Pháp Tiếng Việt (2010) written by Tran Ngoc Dung Firstly, he

gives a simple definition of adjective Secondly, he represents types of adjectives in Vietnamese including impartial adjectives, partial adjectives, semi-partial adjectives and special adjectives His classification is not like other authors’ Then,

he shows one new thing in comparison to other Vietnamese grammarians that is forms of adjective consisting of simple adjectives, compound adjectives and complex adjectives In addition, he describes the position of adjective before and after a noun His final point is about comparison of adjectives

In Tiếng Việt 3 (2003) Hoang Thung points out that Vietnamese adjectives

function as subject, attributive, predicative He continues describing adjective with its conversion into noun In this study, he mentions adjective generally

In conclusion, a lot of studies have been conducted on adjectives in English and in Vietnamese However, most of them only describe adjectives in either English or Vietnamese without comparison between the syntactic functions of English adjectives and those of Vietnamese ones Due to this, Vietnamese learners

of English have some difficulties in using English adjectives Therefore, it is

essential to have a comprehensive study of the syntactic functions of the adjectives

in English in comparison with those in Vietnamese

2 Definitions of adjectives

2.1 Definitions of adjectives in English

People use adjectives in their daily speech, which can denote a person, thing

or phenomenon

For example:

It’s so hot today

All the words “hungry, hot and wonderful” are adjectives So what are

adjectives? There are a lot of definitions of adjectives given by a large number of

grammarians Mentioning adjectives, Michael Swan and Catherine Walter in The

Good Grammar Book (p.199) indicates:

“Adjectives are words like easy, slow, sorry, important, etc They usually

tell you more about people and things.”

Similarly, in Academic Studies English Grammar (Part I: Part of Speech,

1998, p.7) the authors define adjectives as a description of nouns, but in a more

general way “[…] that give the reader a clearer picture of what you mean, [ ]

Words that tell more about pronouns and nouns are called adjectives.”

If the two books define the adjectives in terms of meaning, S Chalkier and

E Weiner, who are the authors of The Oxford Dictionary of English Grammar

(1993, p.18) show the definition of adjectives in terms of both syntactic and

semantic functions, an adjective is “A major part of speech, traditionally defined

as a describing word or ‘a word that tells us something about a noun.”

Those are some ways foreign grammarians define the adjectives in English

2.2 Definitions of adjectives in Vietnamese

For Vietnamese adjectives, Nguyen Van Thanh who is the author of the book

entitled Tiếng Việt Hiện Đại (2003, p.213) states that:

“Tính từ là những từ diễn đạt những đặc điểm về chất lượng, về tính chất,

mù sắc, mùi vị, trạng thái, quan hệ của các danh từ hay đại từ (Đại từ xưng hô, đại từ xác định)”

(Adjectives are words that describe the quality, characteristic, color, state and relationship of nouns or pronouns)

He includes all things and phenomena in the term “noun”, which makes the

definition of Vietnamese adjectives shorter and easier to remember

However, to concretize the meaning of adjective Ngữ Pháp Tiếng Việt (p.17)

written by Nguyen Ly Kha shows that:

“Tính từ là lớp từ loại có ý nghĩa chỉ đặc trưng, tính chất của sự vật, hiện

tượng, hành động, trạng thái, quá trình VÍ dụ: xanh, dỏ, tím, vàng, tốt, xấu, cao, thấp, ít, nhiều, thông minh, ngu, nhanh, chậm…”

(Adjective is a main part of speech denoting the characteristic and quality of objects, actions, states, and processes For instance, they are green, red, violet, yellow, kind, ugly, tall, short, little, much, intelligent, stupid, quick, slow, etc.)

Like other foreign grammarians, she gives the definition of adjectives in Vietnamese from a semantic perspective Hence, it is summarized that adjectives in both English and in Vietnamese is a major part of speech which describes the quality, characteristic, state and relationship of nouns or pronouns

3 Characteristics of adjectives

3.1 Adjectives in English

Basing on the meanings, the adjectives can be divided in to many different

types According to Advanced English grammar and Communication (2008) –

Vipul, there are four principal classes of adjectives such as adjectives of quality,

adjectives of quantity, mineral adjectives, and demonstratives And in Collin

Cobuild English Grammar (1990), William Collins Sons classified the adjectives

into 5 types like qualitative adjectives, classifying adjectives, color adjectives, emphasizing adjectives and determiners However, these two classifications do not include all typical adjectives So in my study, I will present 6 main types of

adjectives in accordance with the book A practical English Grammar written by A

J Thomson and A.V Martinet and other materials which provide a general view on classification of English adjectives

3.1.1.1.1 Demonstrative

Demonstrative adjectives point out which person or thing is meant They

contain this, that, these, those

For example:

I love this book

“This” is the demonstrative adjective showing the book which is near the speaker

3.1.1.1.2 Distributive

They are used with singular nouns to identify them There are 4 distributive

adjectives: each, every, either, and neither

For example:

Every member in my family loves playing badminton

Each person should be responsible for his/her action

“Each” and “every” are distributive adjectives

3.1.1.1.3 Quantitative

This is the family of numeral adjectives and identified ones which is used to answer

the questions “How many/much and Which order” They can be some, any, no, a

little, etc (numeral adjectives or one, two, the first, the eighth, etc., indefinite

adjectives) For example:

“Some” and “30” are quantitative adjectives, of them “some” is indefinite

adjective and “30” is numeral one

3.1.1.1.4 Interrogative

They are often used to ask questions and including which, what, whose

For example: Which pens do you like?

From the example, it is clear that “which” and “what” are interrogative adjectives

3.1.1.1.5 Possessive

A possessive adjective modifies a noun by telling to whom something or

somebody belongs These possessives are popularly used such as my, his, her, their,

our, its, your

For example:

English people don’t like to talk about their private things to others even their friends

I love my family so much

All the words highlighted in the example are possessive adjectives

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On the way to the supermarket, I am met his friends and their baby is

so lovely

The adjective “yellow” indicates the state of changing the color of the leaves

in the fall And the adjective “lovely”describes the quality of a baby which is very

bable

3.1.1.2 Based on the ground of the complexity of the structure

The structure of adjectives is also a basic to classify adjectives They may be short adjectives, long adjectives or special adjectives

3.1.1.2.1 Short adjectives

Short adjectives are adjectives which have one or two syllables In

comparison forms they only need adding “-er” or “-est” to the end of the

adjectives

For example:

Romeo and Juliet written by Shakespeare is a sad and romantic love story

Ho Chi Minh City is bigger than Hanoi

In the example, “sad”and “bigger” are short adjectives with one syllable (“big” is in comparison form) and “romantic” is not one for including three syllables

3.1.1.2.2 Long adjectives

Long adjectives have two or more syllables of which the comparison is

formed by using “more” or “the most” prior to adjectives In the case of the adjectives ending in “y”, “y” is changed into “i” then adding “-er” However, the

adjective “friendly” is a special so when it becomes comparative or superlative it can be used as the the form of short adjectives or long ones Some adjectives can

illustrate them as following: beautiful, important, mischievous, etc The following

sentences are specific samples:

Electric vehicles are friendly with environment

Hoa is the most excellent students in my class

Uranus is the farthest planet from the Sun in the solar system

Basing on the formula, the comparative adjective “better” and the superlative adjective “the farthest”are derived from the positive “good” and “far” respectively

3.1.2 Position of adjectives

Adjectives have function of modifying nouns so they can go before or after a noun The adjectives coming before a noun are called attributive and those coming after linking verbs are called predicate Most adjectives can be both in attributive and predicative positions

For example:

Harry hit an old man (Attributive)

This car is very old (Predicative)

She thinks there is something strange in the box

The adjective in the first sentence attribute the noun “man” and in the second sentence modifies the noun phrase“this car”and it comes after the verb

“is” Lastly, the adjective “strange” become after indefinite pronoun

In Advanced Grammar in Used (2005, p.132), Michael Hewing points out that:

3.2 Adjectives in Vietnamese

3.2.1 Classification

The Vietnamese language is an inflectional one, so the adjectives can be combined with nouns, verbs and other parts of speech to create significant phrases For this reason, adjectives in Vietnamese are classified into rather many different types basing on different criteria In this part, the two ways to divide Vietnamese adjectives are presented

3.2.1.1 Based on the general meaning and the ability of adjectives to combine with adjuncts of degree

From Diep Quang Ban and Hoang Van Thung’s point of view in Ngữ Pháp

Tiếng Việt (2006) and other grammarians, there are two types of adjectives such as

gradable adjectives (adjectives of degree) and non-gradable adjectives basing on the above criteria

3.2.1.1.1 Non-gradable adjectives

They are words themselves implying the absolute sense of quality and characteristic of nouns Moreover, they do not have ability to combine with

adjuncts referring to degree such as rất (very), hơi (quite, a bit), quá (so), kém

(less) For instance, riêng (private), chung (common), trắng tinh (spotlessly white), tím ngắt (dark purple), etc

Hoang Van Thung and Diep Quang Ban continue classifying non-gradable

adjectives into two smaller kinds as following: absolute adjectives (tính từ tuyệt

đối) and absolute adjectives without building pairs of absolute antonyms (tính từ

tuyệt đối không tạo thành các cặp đối lập) The difference between them is directly

shown in their names, in which the absolute adjectives will have couples of absolute opposite whereas the absolute adjectives without building pairs of absolute antonyms will not

Absolute adjectives are usually placed after nouns and verbs to act as

attributive or adverbs like công (public)>< tư (personal), chính (main)>< phụ

(secondary), duy nhất (only)><vô số (countless),etc., most of them have equivalent

antonym adjectives However, some of these adjectives can combine with adjunct

“rất” so as to stress the meaning of the noun

For example:

Mỗi nhà văn, nhà thơ đều mang những hơi thở rất riêng của họ vào trong các tác phẩm

(Any poem and writer transmits their particular style into their works.)

The phrase “rất riêng” completely describes the different styles of the

poems and writers Due to this, thousands of works from thousands of authors are not similar This example shows the case of absolute adjectives in combination with “rất”

Với một số đồng nghiệp ở công ty, Hải hay lấy việc công trả thù riêng

(Hai is a narrow-minded and lasting hatred person to his colleagues.)

Trụ sở chính của Liên Hợp Quốc đặt tại New York

(The official foundation of United Nations is located in New York.)

In the first instance, the absolute adjective “riêng” placed after the verb “trả

thù” indicating a bad behavior In the second example, the adjective

“chính”modifying the noun “trụ sở” become an attributive

About absolute adjectives without building pairs of absolute antonyms, they are normally compound words and reiterative words mainly placed after nouns

Here is a list of them: đỏ lòm (gaudy red), trắng phau (very white), đen sì (very

black), xanh mượt (deep blue), xanh xanh (greenish), etc

“Tái ngắt” is an absolute adjective without absolute antonym, descrbing the

woman’s tireness after hard working

Non-gradable adjectives can completely describe nouns by itself It means these adjective cannot be compared in any degree

3.2.1.1.2 Gradable adjectives

They are words indicating the characteristics of something, people and actions which can be used to compare the degree of these characteristics In

addition, they are able to combine with adjuncts of degree as following: rất (very),

hơi (quite, a bit), quá (so), etc or with numerals

For example: ngắn (short), dài (long), cứng (solid), mềm (soft), đẹp

Mentioning the class of gradable adjectives, Le Bien in Từ Loại Tiếng Việt

Hiện Đại (1999) only mentions features of this class while Diep Quang Ban and

Hoang Van Thung in Ngữ Pháp Tiếng Việt (2006) focus on the classification of

gradable adjectives with adjectives of quality, adjectives of quantity, adjectives of characteristic, and adjectives of intensity

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 Adjectives of quality: chăm chỉ (hard), khéo léo (clever), thông minh

(intelligent), giỏi (good), trang trọng (formal), etc

 Adjectives of quantity: nhiều (many, much), ít (little, few), rậm (thick),

thưa (sparse), đông (crowed), etc

 Adjectives of characteristic: xanh (green), béo (fat), thơm (perfumed), ồn

ào (noisy), đắng (bitter), etc

 Adjectives of intensity: mạnh (strong), yếu (weak), nóng (hot), sáng

(bright), tối (dark), mát mẻ (cool), etc

While non-gradable adjectives have no comparison, the gradable adjectives can be used to make comparison, particularly in proverbs

Examples:

Nhanh như cắt

Khỏe như trâu

The gradable adjectives “nhanh” and “khỏe”appear in proverbs with the comparison form “như” However, the non-gradable adjective “khỏe khoắn” cannot be used as “khỏe khoắn như trâu”

We can easily realize this type of adjectives by making couples of antonym For instance:

Short ><long; old >< young; nice >< ugly; big >< small; smart >< dull 3.2.1.2 Based on the semantics and ability of adjective to control adjuncts after the adjectives

Many Vietnamese grammarians recognize this criterion to classify adjectives

and some of them only concentrate on it In Ngữ Pháp Tiếng Việt Hiện Đại (1980),

Huu Quynh shows two types of Vietnamese adjectives which are adjectives of external features of things and adjectives of internal characteristics and states of things

3.2.1.2.1 Adjectives of external features of things

With these adjectives, users can draw a portrait of person or object It pays attention to the color, appearance, quantity and size; therefore, there are following adjectives:

 Adjectives of color: đỏ (red), tím (violet), vàng (yellow), hồng (pink), da

cam (orange), etc

 Adjectives of appearance: cơ bắp (muscular), gầy (thin), mảnh mai (slim),

xoăn (curly), cao (high), etc

 Adjectives of quantity: đầy (full), trống rỗng (empty), một nửa (half), ít

(few), nhiều (many), etc

 Adjectives of size: nhỏ (small), lớn (big), to (huge), rộng (large), vừa

(fit), etc

They regularly function as the attributive of nouns and verbs

For example:

Chiếc váy đỏ của Loan thật bắt mắt (Modifying noun)

(Loan’s red dress is very eye-catching.)

Mai bị mọi người chú ý khi nói chuyện to trong văn phòng (Modifying verb) (Some people looked at Mai when she spoke loudly.)

The adjective “đỏ”denoting the color of the dress function as an attributive, and the adjective “to” function as an adverb when placed after the verb “nói

chuyện”

3.2.1.2.2 Adjectives of internal characteristics and states of things

These adjectives describe the quality of a person, a thing or an object so they can function as both attributive to nouns and predicative in the sentence Here is a list of them

Tốt (kind), xấu (bad), hiền (gentle), dữ (violent), to gan (daring), mau miệng (voluble), etc

Tản Đà compliment his writing style in the poetry “Hầu Trời”by using adjectives of internal characteristics of things

For example:

Nhời văn chuốt đẹp như sao băng!

Khí văn hùng mạnh như mây chuyển!

Êm như giĩ thoảng, tinh như sương!

Đầm như mưa sa, lạnh như tuyết!

(Hầu Trời, Tản Đà, 1921)

The author utilizes the adjectives “chuốt đẹp”, “hùng mạnh”, “êm”, “tinh”,

“đầm”, and “lạnh” together with comparison estimated as a wonderful scenery

picture

Occasionally, the adjective are able to combine with adverb “đang (be Ving)”, đã (the verb in the past simple), đừng (don’t), hãy (let’s), etc in order to increase the ability to become predicative Obviously, we have the below illustration:

Em tưởng trên mình khơng cĩ bọn ác ơn hay sao Đừng ngây thơ như thế

(Giang Nam) (Do you believe that here are no evil-doers? Do not be so nạve.)

In summary, there are two main ways to classify Vietnamese adjectives Because of being an inflectional language, Vietnamese has its classes of adjectives almost based on the meaning of the adjectives and its ability to combine with other parts of speech

3.2.2 Position of adjectives

Like other parts of speech, adjectives need to have suitable positions to show their functions and meanings Due to the fact that Vietnamese adjectives modify nouns and verbs; they will have two major positions which are after nouns and verbs and before nouns or we can say postposition and preposition

3.2.2.1 After nouns and verbs

Unlike English adjectives, Vietnamese ones are mostly placed after nouns

and verbs The following sentences in Mùa Lá Rụng Trong Vườn (1985, p.87)

written by Ma Văn Kháng will explicit it

“[…], ông Bằng lâng lâng trong những hoài niệm hư ảo, thoát trần Nhưng ông chỉ ở trong dòng tình cảm trôi lững lờ đó trong giây phút.”

([…], Mr Bang is very light in illusory and peaceful thoughts However, he

is only in that sluggish emotion just a few moments)

It is evident that the adjectives “hư ảo (illusory)” and “thoát trần

(peaceful)” are after the noun phrase “những hoài niệm (thoughts)” and the

adjective “lững lờ” (sluggish) is placed after the verb “trôi” to describe the action

In another example, the adjectives are combined with adjuncts in postposition

“Với người vô sản, ở quá rộng là một cái tội, trong khi cán bộ và gia đình phải ở chen chúc trong những khu nhà tập thể, […] Cái mặc cũng sang trọng quá.”

(Một người Hà Nội, Nguyễn Khải) (For proletarians, it will be a sin if they stay in a house so large, while their family and cadres had to hustle in a collective quarter, […] Their dress is also too formal.)

The adjective “rộng” and “chen chúc” both describe the verb “ở” However, in English they become attributive to nouns (“large” is an attributive of

house) or verbs in the clause (“chen chúc” means “hustle”) Only the adjective

“sang trọng” (formal) still keeps its post-position in English

or rhetoric Here are some examples for pre-position adjectives

 Tốt danh hơn lành áo (A good name is better than richness)

 Anh về đi ngủ kẻo khuya

Xấu chuôm cá chẳng vào đia anh đâu!

 Xấu chuôm, tốt cá em ơi

Tốt chuôm mà nỏ có nơi cá nằm

Anh về em nỏ chi đưa Quan sơn nghìn dặm em chưa hết lời

(Kho Tàng Ca Dao Người Việt, Trung tâm Ngôn Ngữ Văn hóa Đông Tây)

All in all, there are two positions of Vietnamese adjectives, before nouns and verbs and after nouns and verbs Normally, adjectives in Vietnamese are used in postposition to show their functions more clearly

4 Syntactic functions of adjectives

4.1 Definitions of syntactic function

Not many definitions of syntactic functions are given by grammarians So in this section I only give two typical definitions from the two foreign and Vietnamese grammarians to help the readers understand more about this term

In the electronic reference material entitled LinguaLinks Library 5.0 Plus

(2003) composed by various authors, a definition of syntactic function is presented:

“A syntactic function is the grammatical relationship of one constituent to another within a syntactic construction.”

(Chức năng ngữ pháp là mối quan hệ ngữ pháp của một thành phần từ loại với những thành phần khác trong một cấu trúc ngữ pháp)

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The definition of syntactic function of adjectives is stated in Ngữ Pháp Tiếng

Việt: Từ Loại (2002) written by Dinh Van Duc He said that the syntactic function

of adjective indicates the ability to be grammatical constituents of an adjective in

a sentence, i.e it brings both some grammatical functions not only one

In a mass, the syntactic function is a manner expressing the grammatical relationship of a part of speech or some of them to another when it is pleaced in one certain position in a sentence

4.2 Syntactic functions of English adjectives

In University Grammar of English (1973), the authors give a complete

picture of syntactic functions of English adjectives with five main types as following: attributive, predicative, postposition, head of noun phrase and verbless adjective clause

4.2.1 Attributive

Attributive is one of the major functions of English adjectives With this function, adjectives modify nouns by appearing between the determiner and the head of noun phrase

For example:

It was rather a rainy day and by mistake Mr Gray shot at one of the other hunters and hit him in the leg

Joe and Helen Mills had two small children

(Nụ cười nước Anh, L A Hill, p.149)

In the above examples, the adjectives “rainy” and “small” are placed after the determiners “a” and numeral “two” and before the noun “day”, “children”

respectively in order to modify them

According to Collin Cobuild English Grammar (1990), “There are a few

adjectives which are always or almost always used in front of the noun and are rarely used as complement of linking verbs These adjectives are called attributive adjectives.”

The first type mentioned in this part is classifying adjectives identifying someone or something as a member of class Here is a list of classifying adjectives used attributively

countless existing occasional chemical orchestra outdoor

digital federal phonetic reproductive smokeless western

Some following sentences show this function of the adjectives

Colossus developed during the Second World War to decrypt Germany massage was the first electronic digital computer

We do not use: The first electronic computer was digital

It is better for children to take part in outdoor activities

We do not use : Some activities like playing sports, picnicking are outdoor

Emphasizing adjectives which emphasize your feelings about people or things you are talking about are usually used in attributive, too They include:

entire absolute true blooming freezing

The position of these adjectives is illustrated in the following examples

We were impressed by the sheer size of the cathedral

It cannot be said: The size of the Cathedral is sheer

Hoang Anh Tuan was an outright winner in the Asian Weightlifting Champion

It cannot be said: Hoang Anh Tuan was outright

If these classifying and emphasizing adjectives are placed after linking verbs

or the verb “be”, they don’t have enough sense to modify nouns

Most qualitative adjectives are used in both positions; however, a few of them only come before nouns Here is a list of them:

unenviable fleeting thankless ramshackle choked

For example:

She expected to have a fleeting visit to Singapore

We do not say: A visit to Singapore is fleeting

There are more and more ramshackle buildings in cities

We do not say: More and more buildings are ramshackle

4.2.2 Predicative

It is also an essential syntactic function of adjectives when the adjectives are used after verb “be” ad copular verbs (seem, sound, feel, find, etc) to describe the subjects or the objects Therefore, predicative adjectives can be subject complement and object complement

4.2.2.1 Subject complements

Predicative adjectives function as subject complement when they come after verb “be” and copular verbs including structure SVC