Predicate Nominatives and Adjectives Defined

Predicate Nominatvies: Any PN will fit the following criteria. PN's ...

-are nouns or pronouns
-occur in sentences with linking verbs
-define what or who the subject is

The PN is the word in the sentence that completes the idea begun with the subject and the linking verb. For example, in the sentence 'My cousin is chief of police.', 'cousin' is the subject, 'is' is the predicate and 'chief' is what the cousin is. Try turning the sentence into SAD form and filling in the blank. Look below for another example:

If you try hard enough, you can be anything.
Subject = You
Predicate = Can Be
What? = anything

Anything is a pronoun so the compliment is a PN.

Predicate Adjectives: Any PA will fit the following criteria. PA's ...

-are adjectives
-occur in sentences with linking verbs
-describe what the subject is like

The PA is the word that describes the subject in a sentence that has a linking verb. For example, in the sentence 'The steamy food was brown.' the subject is 'food' the predicate is 'was' and what was the food? Brown. Like PN's try turning the sentence into SAD form and filling in the blank. Look below for another example:

Without any help, Jerome was brilliant.
Subject = Jerome
Predicate = was
What? = brilliant

Brilliant is an adjective, so the compliment is a PA.

 

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