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Gradable vs Non-Gradable Adjectives

The document discusses gradable and non-gradable adjectives. It states that gradable adjectives like "hot" can vary in intensity, while non-gradable adjectives like "freezing", "dead", and "nuclear" describe extremes, absolutes, or classifications that cannot vary. Gradable adjectives can take grading adverbs and have comparative and superlative forms, while non-gradable adjectives are generally used alone or with non-grading adverbs that add emphasis rather than varying intensity.

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83 views4 pages

Gradable vs Non-Gradable Adjectives

The document discusses gradable and non-gradable adjectives. It states that gradable adjectives like "hot" can vary in intensity, while non-gradable adjectives like "freezing", "dead", and "nuclear" describe extremes, absolutes, or classifications that cannot vary. Gradable adjectives can take grading adverbs and have comparative and superlative forms, while non-gradable adjectives are generally used alone or with non-grading adverbs that add emphasis rather than varying intensity.

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hossein sr
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© © All Rights Reserved
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The adjective hot is gradable.

Other qualities cannot vary in intensity or grade because they are:

• extremes (for example: freezing)

• absolutes (for example: dead)

• classifying (for example: nuclear)

The adjectives freezing, dead and nuclear are non-gradable.

0
( ltoiling is
boiling 100 < non-grodoble

extremely hot
very hot
hot
rather hot •ot
fairly hot ond
cold
fairly cold ore
rather cold grodoble
cold
very cold
extremely cold
freezing is
freezing O < non..grodoble
Gradable Adjectives
A gradable adjective can be used with "grading adverbs" that vary the
adjective's grade or intensity. Look at these examples:

grading adverbs + gradable adjectives ]


a little, dreadfully, extremely, angry, big, busy, clever, cold, deep,
fairly, hugely, immensely, fast, friendly, good, happy, high, hot,
intensely, rather, reasonably, important, long, popular, rich, strong,
slightly, unusually, very tall, warm, weak, young
J

EnglishClub TIP

"Gradable adjectives" are also called "qualitative adjectives". "Grading


adverbs" are also called "submodifiers".

A gradable adjective can also have comparative and superlative forms:

• big, bigger, the biggest


• hot, hotter, the hottest
• important, more important, the most important
Often, non-gradable adjectives are used alone:

• It was freezing outside.


• The dog was dead.
• He is investing in nuclear energy.

However, a non-gradable adjective can be used with "non-grading adverbs"


(which usually just give the adjective extra impact), for example:

non-grading adverbs non-gradable adjectives

absolutely awful extreme

unerly excellent

completely terrified

totally dead absolute

nearly impossible

virtually unique

essentially chemical classifying

mainly digital

almost domestic
Adverbs used with gradable and non-gradable adjectives

The adverbs really (very much) and fairly and pretty (both meaning "to a
significant degree, but less than very") can often be used with gradable and
non-gradable adject ives:

gradable non-grad able

Please don't fo rget! It's really He was really terrified.


important.

He's a fairly rich man. It's a fairly impossible job.

He's pretty tall. It's pretty ridiculous when you think


about it.

"Quite" with gradable and non-gradable adjectives

The sense of the adverb "quite" changes according to t he gradability of the


adject ive t hat we use it with:

adjective sense

It's quite warm today. gradable fa irly, rather

Are you quite certain? non-gradabl e completely, absolutely

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