Think of them as nouns that learned how to multitask. The experienced summer baseball league staffįinally, should an attributive noun be used with a real adjective, the adjective always comes first:Īttributive nouns do some of the same work that adjectives do, but that doesn't mean they're not nouns.

While attributive nouns can come in pairs (or trios), they don't get separated by a comma: In that case, the first noun 'acts as' an adjective. So what distinguishes attributive nouns from adjectives? The categorization can be tricky, but here are two general rules:ġ. An attributive noun can only modify a noun when it comes immediately before it: It's a business meeting, not a meeting that is business.Ģ. Attributive nouns don't have comparative forms, but many adjectives do: One building can be taller or more impressive than another, but it can't be more apartment than another. Noun as Adjective As you know, 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. They're called 'attributive nouns.' Attributive here means 'joined directly to a noun in order to describe it.'

In each of these, the italicized word is defined in dictionaries only as a noun, but there it is, modifying another noun. Sometimes, though, we see words we're told are nouns doing that same job: In this example, bright is an adverb because it’s describing the color yellow (adjective), which is describing the flowers (noun). While adverbs and adjectives are both parts of speech that are used to describe something, the difference between them is what they describe. An attributive noun is a noun which modifies another noun-like 'singles' in the phrase 'singles bar'. The bright yellow flowers lined the road.

What do adjectives describe