Do you have a minute to spare to learn some English? Sam tells us how to turn adjectives into nouns for groups of people in general. Give us 60 seconds and we’ll give you the English!
Sam
Hi! I’m Sam from BBC Learning English. And today, let’s look at how we can change adjectives into nouns when talking about groups of people in general.
I’m from England and I can talk about people from my country in two ways:
‘English people talk about the weather a lot,’ where I use the adjective English to describe the noun people.
Or I can take the adjective English and turn it into a noun with the: ‘The English talk about the weather a lot.‘
You can use this rule to talk about other groups of people as well. For example: The rich have more than the poor.
But be careful! Yes, the groups of people are plural, and yes the verb is plural, but we don’t add ‘s’ to the end of these words.
The + adjective = group noun
The + adjective
When we add the to an adjective, we create a group noun that means ‘people who are X,’ where X is the adjective. This is possible with lots of different adjectives, though most commonly with nationalities, or well-known groups of people: e.g. the French, the poor, the unemployed etc.
These groups are plural nouns and so take a plural verb. However, we don’t add ‘s’ to them like many other plural forms of a noun.
- The English talk about the weather a lot.
- The rich have more than the poor.
- After the accident, the injured were taken to the hospital.