When planning a new ad campaign, a market researcher needs to talk about their target audiences. Instead of always saying "young people" or "wealthy people," you can turn an adjective into a noun to mean "the young" or "the wealthy."
In Icelandic, when you do this to describe a general or mixed group of people, use the masculine plural form of the adjective.
General groups: Strong adjectives
When you talk about a demographic group in general, the adjective takes the strong plural ending. Because these adjectives are acting as nouns, their case changes depending on their role in the sentence.
Here are the strong masculine plural endings for adjectives:
- Nominative: -ir
- Accusative: -a
- Dative: -um
- Genitive: -ra
When acting as the direct object of a verb, use the accusative form (-a).
| It is important to map out the well-off. | Það er mikilvægt að kortleggja velstæða. |
When talking about a trait belonging to a group—like the purchasing power of the young, or the buying behavior of the wealthy—use the genitive form (-ra).
| What is the purchasing power of the young today? | Hver er kaupmáttur ungra í dag? |
| The market researcher intends to analyze the buying behavior of the wealthy. | Markaðsfræðingurinn ætlar að greina kauphegðun ríkra. |
Adjectives after prepositions and verbs
Just like regular nouns, these "adjective-nouns" must also change case to match the preposition or verb that controls them.
For example, the preposition fyrir (for) takes the accusative (-a), while hjá (among/with) takes the dative (-um).
| The consumer intends to view the new campaign for the elderly. | Neytandinn ætlar að skoða nýju herferðina fyrir aldraða. |
| It is difficult to change buying behavior among the conservative. | Það er erfitt að breyta kauphegðun hjá íhaldssömum. |
Certain verbs also demand the dative case. For instance, the person you sell (selja) something to will be in the dative form (-um).
| It is easy to sell this product to the innovative. | Það er auðvelt að selja nýjungagjörnum þessa vöru. |
Specific groups: Weak adjectives
If you want to single out a specific group, use a demonstrative word like þessir (these). Placing a pointing word in front makes the adjective weak.
Weak plural adjectives are incredibly simple: they always end in -u, regardless of their case.
| These conservative people often have high purchasing power. | Þessir íhaldssömu hafa oft mikinn kaupmátt. |
| We intend to map out these innovative people. | Við ætlum að kortleggja þessa nýjungagjörnu. |