For Beginners
BAGS ADJECTIVES
The general rule for adjectives in French is noun first, adjective second. Of course though, like everything else in life, there are exceptions. Luckily, those exceptions come with a pretty convenient way to remember them. It's an acronym, called BAGS. It stands for:
Beauty
Age
Goodness
Size
That means that the adjectives related to beauty, age, goodness, and size will come BEFORE the noun, not after. Here's the list of adjectives, in masculine form, that take BAGS.
BEAUTY: beau (handsome), joli (pretty)
AGE: nouveau (new), jeune (young), vieux (old)
GOODNESS: bon (good), mauvais (bad), gentil (kind)
SIZE: grand (big/tall), petit (small), gros (fat), long (long), court (short)
Now here's where I messed up when I was learning BAGS for the first time. Those are the ONLY adjectives that take BAGS. Even ones that seem like they would fit into the BAGS categories don't fit unless they're in that list. For instance, I once tried to use the word "moche" (meaning ugly) as a BAGS adjective, because ugliness is related to beauty. But that just doesn't fly. The BAGS acronym is a great memory jogger, but it shouldn't be taken as a rule that because an adjective has something to do with a category, it's a BAGS adjective. That's just not the case.
Some examples of sentences using BAGS adjectives:
Elle porte un beau chapeau. -- She's wearing a beautiful hat.
La jeune fille aime chanter. -- The young girl loves to sing.
C'est une bonne idée! -- That's a good idea!
Some sentences using adjectives that do NOT fit into BAGS:
C'est un garçon moche. -- That's an ugly boy.
Je vois l'oiseau jaune. -- I see the yellow bird.
Il aime la fille américaine. -- He loves the American girl.
To learn more about BAGS adjectives and French adjectives in general, click here:
