1 Adjective Classes in Typological Perspective 13Australian languages are like the languages of Europe in that adjectives have
very similar morphological possibilities to nouns. Some languages have noun
classes (similar to genders) and this is accepted as a viable criterion. But for lan-
guages without this aid, it is often said that there is no separate class of adjectives
(see, among others, Eades 1979 on Gumbaynggir). It is instructive to consider the
implications of this position. If a language has a category of gender, then it will
have a class of adjectives. If it loses gender, then presumably it loses adjectives as a
separate word class. If it then redevelops gender marking, it will regain an adjective
class. Such a scenario is surely unacceptable.
In a classic study, Alpher (1991:22-6) investigates the basis for recognising a class
of adjectives in Yir-Yoront, an Australian language which lacks noun classes/gen-
ders. There is no obvious clear-cut criterion to distinguish adjectives from nouns,
the two types of word having virtually the same morphological and syntactic
properties. Alpher is, however, able to suggest five fairly subtle properties in which
nouns and adjectives differ. One he labels grading': 'Both "nouns" and "adjectives"
occur with postposed morr "real, actual, very". With common nouns, morr has the
sense "actual present-day", as in kay morr "the present-day (steel) axe", or "real and
not imaginary", as in warrchuwrr morr "a real woman (not one in a dream)". With
"adjectives" susceptible of grading, however, morr means "very": karntl morr "very
big", wil morr "very bitter". Such adjectives, moreover, can be quantified with adpo-
sitions like mangl "a little", as in mangl-karnti "a little bit big", wil+mangl "a little bit
bitter"; common nouns lack this possibility.'
The modern discipline of linguistics has been centred on the study of European
languages, and is generally undertaken by speakers of European languages. There
has, as a consequence, arisen the idea that if a language has an adjective class, then
it should be similar to the adjective class in European languages; that is, function-
ing directly as the modifier of a noun in an NP, acting as copula complement, and
showing morphological categories similar to those of nouns (number, case, etc.),
quite different from the categories applying to verbs (tense, aspect, mood, etc.).
This has undoubtedly played a role in the failure to recognize an adjective class
for languages in which adjectives show a rather different profile, functioning as
head of an intransitive predicate (rather than as copula complement), and hav-
ing some of the same morphological properties as verbs. There is an oft-repeat-
ed tradition of saying that in Chinese 'all adjectives are verbs' (see, among many
others, Hockett 1958: 223, Lyons 1968:324-5, Li and Thompson 1981:141, Schachter
1985:18). This lacks insight. In an important study, Xu (1988) demonstrates a range
of criteria for recognizing adjectives to be a separate word class in Chinese. For
example, adjectives and verbs show different syntax when modifying a noun with-
in an NP, have different aspectual possibilities when functioning as intransitive
predicate, take different derivational possibilities. In addition, reduplication has
different semantic implications for the two word classes; see (14-15) in §6.1.
Even when a linguist does provide criteria for distinguishing adjectives from
verbs (in a language where adjectives can function as intransitive predicate), there