Level: Beginner-Intermediate
A noun is a person, place or thing, and an adjective is a word that describes a noun. Sometimes we use a noun to describe another noun. We can use a noun as an adjective when it follows a noun that it modifies. In that case, the first noun “acts as” an adjective.
- We write the “noun as adjective” and the real noun in several ways.
two separate words (bathroom door)
two hyphenated words (head-master)
one word (bedroom)
- The “noun as adjective” always comes first.
a race car is a car that you use in racing
a horse race is a race for horses
a car race is a race for cars
a love story is a story about love
a ping-pong ball is a ball for playing ping-pong
tennis shoes are shoes for playing tennis
an art exhibition is an exhibition of arts
a book shop is a shop that sells books
- The “noun as adjective” is singular. Just like a real adjective, the “noun as adjective” is never changing. It is usually in the singular form.
car race – car races
(NOT cars race, cars races)
footballer – footballers
(NOT feetballer, feetballers)
shoe cabinet – shoe cabinets
(NOT shoes cabinet, shoes cabinets)
- Some nouns look plural but we normally treat them as singular. When we use these nouns “as adjectives” they stay the same.
News:
a news reporter, two news reporters
Billiards:
one billiards table, two billiards tables
Athletics:
an athletics coach, two athletics coach
- When we use certain nouns “as adjectives” (clothes, sports, customs, accounts, arms), we use them in the plural form.
sports team – sports teams
customs officer – customs officers
clothes shop – clothes shops
- Just like adjectives, we can also use more than one “noun as adjective” together.
machine production costs: we are talking about the costs of producing machines
Spain football team coach: we are talking about the coach who trains the team that plays football for Spain
animal research center: we are talking about a center that researches into animals