Order of Adjectives in English

Hi, my name is Alex, and welcome to this lesson on ordering adjectives.

Now, when we want to assign a particular quality to a noun, we use adjectives.

When we want to assign more than one quality, let's say three different qualities, to a

noun, there is actually a specific order that we have to use for the adjectives that we

are using.

Most native speakers are even unaware that this rule exists.

They simply do it naturally, so they would say "the big red bag," for example, instead

of "the red big bag," which sounds a little off to native speakers.

So again, most native speakers are unaware that this rule even exists, but good news

for you is that you'll be able to sound just like a native speaker after this lesson when

you want to order your adjectives to describe something.

Okay, so first of all, we would have, when you're trying to describe something, you would

have your opinion first.

So if you think something is ugly, or pretty, or nice, it would be the first thing that

you would say when you're trying to describe a noun.

Secondly, you would choose the size, so big, large.

Thirdly, is age, how old it is, is it old, new?

Fourth is shape, is it round, is it square, maybe it's oval, I'm not sure, whatever it

is that you're describing.

Fifth is color, pretty straightforward, is it black, blue, red, green?

Sixth, material, what is it made of?

Is it steel, is it maybe, could it be cotton, I'm not sure.

Seventh, origin, origin means where is it from, where was it made?

And eighth is purpose, so what is it used for?

For example, this is the concept that's a little difficult for some people to understand,

so I'll use the example of a teacher.

If you want to describe a teacher, for example, and you want to call them old and boring,

but they're a specific kind of teacher, so you would say the old, boring physics teacher.

So the physics teacher, the physics part is the purpose of the teacher, what kind of teacher

is it?

Okay, so what I have on the board now is an example of a sentence, and I want you to tell

me whether it follows the rules that I just told you.

So the sentence I have describes a plane, or an airplane, it says the Canadian Red Large

Plane.

It doesn't sound quite right, the Canadian Red Large Plane.

Okay, but how do we make this correct?

Well, simply look at our chart.

So what's the first thing we have to look at?

Opinion.

Is there really an opinion in here?

Red, large, Canadian, nope.

Size.

Okay, there's large.

First thing we would do is say large.

We would say the large age, nope, shape, nope, how about color?

There's a color in there, right?

Red.

So next is red.

The large, red, and the last thing here that we have is Canadian, Canadian is the origin

of the plane.

So we would say the large, red, Canadian, plane.

Okay, now I want you to keep in mind that this is simply a guide.

For instance, if you look at 1 and 2, I put an asterisk beside them, opinion and size.

This is because you can actually play around with the size of something and with your opinion

of something depending on which quality you want to emphasize.

So for instance, if you see a big ugly car outside and you want to say that is a big

ugly car, you want to emphasize its size, you would say that is a big ugly car.

If you want to emphasize its ugliness, you would say that is one ugly big car, okay?

So again, this is simply a guideline.

If you follow these rules, you'll sound like a native speaker in no time.

Now for a quiz on this material, you can visit www.engvid.com where you can also check out

other videos as well.

I hope you enjoyed this one.

My name is Alex, take care.