Adjectival category

In this paper, we first propose evidence for the status of adjectives as an independent word-class in Mandarin Chinese, both as the instantiation of a universal prototype and as a language-specific category, also discussing functionally-based and semantically-based subclasses of adjectives. We then discuss the implications of our proposal for language teaching, showing that English-language, Italian and Chinese teaching materials tend to oversimplify the nature and properties of Chinese adjectives. We suggest that instructors and textbooks should illustrate the various subclasses of adjectives, stressing the differences in their usage and discussing adjective/verb conversion