- Joined
- Jul 29, 2006
- Location
- Spencers Wood, near Reading, UK
- Member Type
- Retired English Teacher
- Native Language
- English
- Home Country
- UK
- Current Location
- UK
Basically the title was a reduced form of the question I asked in the first message.
I usually try to be precise with the title of a thread, but I would never imagine that there would be so much attention to it
The problem Alex is the distinction between form and function. In form, 'homeless' is an adjective; in 'The homeless' it has the function of a noun. The discussion seems to be creating more heat than light. I wish when people said categorically things like 'homeless is a noun' they took care to add 'in function' - knowing that students will have been taught that the word is an adjective (esp. if their L1 lets them use the form <article> + <adj> in this way, as many do).
Carry on please... ;-)
b