Adjective and Number

@wittynet (4421)
Philippines
May 16, 2011 4:07am CST
Does an adjective smart have a plural form? I just saw this line in one of my training modules: smarts, searching prowess, creativity Smart is an adjective, so why is there a need to make it plural?
2 responses
Just an Ordinary Owl?
@owlwings (43897)
• Cambridge, England
16 May 11
Smart can be a verb, an adjective or a noun (and can even be used as an adverb in place of 'smartly' but this is not normally considered good English) The use of 'smarts' in the plural, as in your example, is a US slang expression meaning 'intelligence' or 'common sense'. "He never had the smarts to use his opportunities." It is not infrequently found in business training and team-building documents.
wittynet
@wittynet (4421)
• Philippines
21 Nov 11
I have learned a lot from your posts. I really appreciate your time posting answers here, owlwings.
zills66
@zills66 (1419)
• Saudi Arabia
16 May 11
am bad at writing and i'm still on the learning process of using the engish language. however, the word smart which is an adjective may grammatically be numbered followed by a category referring to two or more items, unit or etc..
Just an Ordinary Owl?
@owlwings (43897)
• Cambridge, England
16 May 11
An adjective in English is never modified to agree with the number, gender or case of the noun it qualifies. The word 'smarts' could only be a verb ('It smarts when you apply iodine to a wound') or a noun (in fact, in this case, a slang expression meaning 'intelligence' or 'common sense').