Japanese adjectives i

Adjectives describe the property and the state of things and people. Adverbs, on the other
hand, describe the manner of actions. This chapter shows how adjectives and adverbs are
used, what forms they take, and how they can form a variety of comparative sentences.

Adjective types
Adjectives modify nouns. In fact, verbs and nouns can also modify nouns: Verbs in the
plain form can be placed before a noun; nouns can be followed by the particle の no and
placed before a noun.

For example:
これは日本で売っている本です。
Kore wa Nihon de utte iru hon desu.
This is a book sold in Japan.
これは日本の本です。
Kore wa Nihon no hon desu.
This is a Japanese book.

However, adjectives have distinct endings when placed before nouns as modifiers.
They all end in either い i or な na.

For example:
これは高い本です。
Kore wa takai hon desu.
This is an expensive book.
これは高価な本です。
Kore wa kōka na hon desu.
This is an expensive book.

Adjectives that end in い i when placed before a noun are called i adjectives.
Adjectives that end in な na when placed before a noun are called na adjectives.
For example, 高い takai and 高価な kōka na in the examples above both mean
expensive, but the former is an i adjective and the latter is a na adjective. Some adjectives
were created from words borrowed from other languages. Such adjectives all belong to na
adjectives.

For example:
シンプルなドレス sinpuru na doresu a simple dress
エレガントなドレス ereganto na doresu an elegant dress
デリケートな肌 derikēto na hada delicate skin
There is a third category of adjectives that some linguists call no-type adjectives. In this
book, however, such an adjective is treated as a noun followed by の no, as in 病気の人
byōki no hito (sick person).

Basic adjective forms

The part of an adjective without the ending い i or な na (e.g., 高 taka and 高価
kōka) is called the stem. The stem of a na adjective patterns just like a noun: It can be
followed by all forms of the copular verb, including です desu, じゃありません ja
arimasen, だ da, and だった datta, when used as part of a sentence predicate, just like a
noun. Because of this, na adjectives are also called adjectival nouns. The stem of an i
adjective is followed by unique inflectional endings, including い i, くku, and かった
katta, when used as a sentence predicate.

They can end sentences without being followed by the copular verb. For this reason, i
adjectives are sometimes called adjectival verbs. In this case, the copular verb is not needed
except to make the phrase polite.

The following table summarizes how adjectives pattern as sentence predicates: