Adjectives #5 | Intensifiers + Mitigators | Basic English Grammar

Hello students and welcome back to my English course on adjectives.

In this video, I'm going to talk to you about intensifiers and mitigators.

Now what are those?

Don't be scared of by their names.

Intensifiers are simply words that will make adjectives stronger.

They will give adjectives more power or more emphasis.

For example, two very common intensifiers in English are ‘really’ and ‘very’.

Mitigators on the other hand, make the adjectives weaker like the words b'rather' or fairly'.

But we're gonna go into a little more detail.

Keep watching.

Let's start with intensifiers.

And I have a list of intensifies for you.

Of course these are not all of them, but it's a good start because they are very common

in English.

Let's have a look.

really This video is really interesting.

The adjectives in this sentence is 'interesting' and we make it stronger with the intensifier,

‘really’.

It's really interesting.

very For example, I'm very happy to learn English.

The adjective is ‘happy’.

And we give it more power with the intensifier.

very I am very happy to learn English.

Other intensifiers include absolutely.

For example, 'Your new dress is absolutely amazing'.

‘extremely’ Like

‘It's extremely cold outside.”

‘incredibly’ For example, ‘Your son is incredibly smart.’

‘completely’ ‘My wallet is completely empty.’

unusually ‘The classroom was unusually quiet.’

And finally, ‘enough’.

‘He isn't old enough to drive.’

Now for this last sentence, the adjective is old and II intensifier is enough.

It's a special case because as you can hear and see, ‘enough’ always comes after the

adjective.

Intensifiers are commonly used with comparative and superlative adjectives.

For example, with comparative adjectives, we often use 'much'.

For example, ‘He runs much faster than me.’

‘Faster’ is the comparative form of the adjective ‘fast’.

And to intensify the comparison, we use the intensifier ‘much’.

So he runs much faster than me.

We also use ‘a lot’.

For example, ‘This red bag is a lot heavier than this white bag’.

‘heavier’ is the comparative form of the adjective ‘heavy’.

And we make it even more powerful with ‘a lot heavier’.

And we also use ‘far’.

For example, ‘She is far taller than me’.

‘taller’ is the comparative of ‘tall’.

We make it more powerful with ‘far’.

‘Far taller than me’.

Now with superlative adjectives, we can use ‘easily’.

For example, ‘This is easily the best restaurant in town’.

‘best’ is the superlative form of the adjective ‘good’.

And we make it even more powerful by saying, ‘easily the best restaurant’.

And we also use ‘by far’.

For example, ‘Sarah is by far the smartest girl in class’.

Let's move on to mitigators.

Now mitigators are the opposite of intensifiers.

They weaken the adjectives.

Let's look at a few examples.

Mitigators include ‘fairly’.

For example, ‘It's fairly sunny today’.

The adjective ‘sunny’ is weakened by the mitigator ‘fairly’.

So it's not sunny. It's a bit less than sunny.

Other mitigator, ‘rather’.

So when I say, ‘I'm rather tired’, I'm not exactly tired.

I'm a bit less.

The adjective is less powerful because of this ‘rather’.

Other example, ‘pretty’.

‘It's pretty expensive’.

Which means it's not expensive.

It's a little bit less.

Or 'quite'. Like, ‘The movie was quite good’.

The adjective ‘good’ is less powerful because of this ‘quite’.

Now be very careful because if you use ‘quite’ with an extreme adjective such as ‘terrible’,

‘perfect’, ‘enormous’, or ‘excellent’

quite means ‘absolutely’.

It becomes an intensifier.

For example, ‘She is quite gorgeous.’

Means she is absolutely gorgeous.

It's more powerful because of the intensified ‘quite’.

So be very careful when you use ‘quite’ because depending on the adjective that you

choose, it has a different meaning.

And it can be either an intensifier or a mitigator.

Let's move on.

Just as intensifiers, mitigators can be used with comparative adjectives.

Let's look at a few examples.

We can use ‘a bit’.

For example, ‘He's a bit faster than me’.

When you say, “He's a bit faster than me,”

it's less powerful than “He's faster than me.”

So ‘a bit’ mitigates. It weakens ‘faster’.

Same goes for ‘rather’.

For example, ‘This dress is rather nicer than that dress’.

It weakens the comparison - the nicer.

And finally we can say, ‘slightly’.

For example, ‘My car is slightly older than your car’.

So it's just a little bit older than your car.

It's weak because of this mitigator.

Let's now move on to practice.

I want things to be very clear so I have a few example sentences for you guys.

And I want you to tell me if you see an intensifier or a mitigator.

Let's have a look.

First, ‘It's a very interesting game’.

Now what's the adjective in that sentence?

‘interesting’ of course.

What about ‘very’.

Is it an intensifier or a mitigator?

What do you think?

It's an intensifier of course.

It's a very interesting game.

It's more powerful thanks to this ‘very’.

The second sentence, ‘She cooks fairly good pasta’.

Now the adjective in this sentence is ‘good’.

I'm sure you know.

What about ‘fairly’?

Is it an intensifier or a mitigator?

It's a mitigator guys.

The adjective ‘good’ is less powerful because of ‘fairly’.

‘She cooks fairly good pasta’.

The third example, ‘He's quite brilliant at speaking English’.

The adjective is ‘brilliant’.

Now just a hint.

It's an extreme adjective.

‘brilliant’ is a very strong adjective, so what about ‘quite’?

Is it an intensifier or a mitigator?

It is an intensifier of course because the adjective is extreme.

I hope you got that.

Next example.

‘She's a bit younger than I am’.

The adjective is actually a comparative adjective in this sentence.

‘younger’

'a bit' acts as a mitigator of course.

And finally, ‘My dog is much fatter than my cat’.

Again, it's a comparative adjective - ‘fatter’.

And what about ‘much’?

What do you think?

Intensifier, mitigator?

It's an intensifier.

It's much fatter than my cat.

Good job guys.

Let's move on.

Let's go through the sentences again and focus on pronunciation.

Please repeat after me.

It's a very interesting game.

One more time.

It's a very interesting game.

Good.

Second example.

She cooks fairly good pasta.

She cooks fairly good pasta.

Third example guys.

He's quite brilliant at speaking English.

One more time.

He's quite brilliant at speaking English.

Moving on.

She's a bit younger than I am.

She's a bit younger than I am.

And finally, my dog is much fatter than my cat.

My dog is much fatter than my cat.

Excellent guys.

Thank you guys for watching the video.

I hope this has helped.

Now using intensifiers and mitigators takes practice.

A lot of practice.

But I'm sure you can do it and it's worth it.

It will make a true difference to your speaking skills.

Thank you for watching.

See you next time.

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