Adjective
Potential content
- Adjectives negated with 不
- Adjectives can form positive-negative questions.
- Adjective reduplication
- Some adjectives can be reduplicated for emphasis.
- They are reduplicated AABB e.g. 干干净净, ABB e.g. 红通通 or BABA e.g. 雪白雪白
- 的 must be used with reduplicated adjectives.
- Some adjectives can be reduplicated for emphasis.
- Can be followed by complements
- Can function as predicate. 是 is not used with adjectives.
- 很 can be used with adjectives
- 很 in neutral tone just indicates the predicate.
- 很 in third tone adds emphasis to the adjective.
- Some adjectives are not preceded by 很, but are followed by 了: 饿, 渴, 病
- 很 can be used with adjectives
- Single character adjectives can modify directly, e.g. 新书. 的 can optionally be inserted to emphasise the adjective: 新的书.
- A two character adjective modifying a single character noun has to have 的, e.g. 好看的画.
- If the adjective and noun are both two characters, 的 is optional as with single character adjectives.
- Rules for 的 for modifying nouns also apply to 地 for modifying verbs.
- 多 and 少 are special
- Must be combined with 很 or 不 to form attributives for nouns
- 的 is not necessary with 多 and 少.
- Different ways to say:
- Bad
- Nice
- Beautiful
- Patterns
- 半 ... 不 ...
- 甭提多 / 别提多
Sources and further reading
- 外国人实用汉语语法(中英文对照) (pp. 48 - 57)4
- Basic Patterns of Chinese Grammar (pp. 56 - 64)
- 实用汉语语法 (pp. 52 - 54)
- Modern Mandarin Chinese Grammar: A Practical Guide (pp. 56 - 68)
- 汉语常用格式330例