Contents of Chapter 3

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Contents 1

Editorial team 6

Introduction 6

Note on Examples 10

Guide to the Use of the Grammar 11

Glossary of grammatical terms 13

Cobuild Grammar Chart 21

Contents of Chapter 1 22

1 Referring to people and things 26

Introduction to the noun group 26

Identifying people and things: nouns 28

Things which can be counted: count nouns 29

Things not usually counted: uncount nouns 31

When there is only one of something: singular nouns 33

Referring to more than one thing: plural nouns 34

Referring to groups: collective nouns 36

Referring to people and things by name: proper nouns 37

Nouns which are rarely used alone 38

Sharing the same quality: adjectives as headwords 39

Nouns referring to males or females 40

Referring to activities and processes: '-ing' nouns 41

Specifying more exactly: compound nouns 42

Referring to people and things without naming them: pronouns 44

Referring to people and things: personal pronouns 44

Mentioning possession: possessive pronouns 47

Referring back to the subject: reflexive pronouns 47

Referring to a particular person or thing: demonstrative pronouns 48

Referring to people and things in a general way: indefinite pronouns 49

Showing that two people do the same thing: reciprocal pronouns 51

Joining clauses together: relative pronouns 51

Asking questions: interrogative pronouns 52

Other pronouns 53

Identifying what you are talking about: determiners 54

The specific way: using 'the' 54

The specific way: using 'this', 'that', 'these', and 'those' 57

The specific way: using possessive determiners 58

The general way 60

The general way: using 'a' and 'an' 61

The general way: other determiners 62

Contents of Chapter 2 65

2 Giving information about people and things 70

Introduction 70

Describing things: adjectives 71

Information focusing: adjective structures 72

Identifying qualities: qualitative adjectives 72

Identifying the class that something belongs to: classifying adjectives 73

Identifying colours: colour adjectives 74

Showing strong feelings: emphasizing adjectives 75

Making the reference more precise: postdeterminers 76

Special classes of adjectives 76

Position of adjectives in noun groups 78

Special forms: '-ing' adjectives 80

Special forms: '-ed' adjectives 81

Compound adjectives 84

Comparing things: comparatives 86

Comparing things: superlatives 87

Other ways of comparing things: saying that things are similar 89

Indicating different amounts of a quality: submodifiers 91

Indicating the degree of difference: submodifiers in comparison 94

Modifying using nouns: noun modifiers 96

Indicating possession or association: possessive structures 97

Indicating close connection: apostrophe s ('s) 98

Other structures with apostrophe s ('s) 98

Talking about quantities and amounts 99

Talking about amounts of things: quantifiers 99

Talking about amounts of things: partitives 102

Referring to an exact number of things: numbers 105

Referring to the number of things: cardinal numbers 105

Referring to things in a sequence: ordinal numbers 108

Referring to an exact part of something: fractions 109

Talking about measurements 110

Talking about age 112

Approximate amounts and measurements 113

Expanding the noun group: qualifiers 114

Nouns with prepositional phrases 115

Nouns with adjectives 117

Nouns with non-finite clauses 118

Contents of Chapter 3 119