Question

Is “a lot” an adjective?

Answer 1

Hint: "A lot" is used at places to indicate a large extent or a large amount. If it is used as an adverb, it shows “to a great extent”. The phrase is used to indicate some big and huge quantities. It signifies large degrees. In language, an adjective is a word that enhances a noun. It is important for enhancing the quality of speech.

Complete answer:
"A lot" is used to shows a large extent or degree, and it can be countable. It can explain the number of objects, the extent of an action's result, etc."A lot of" is adjective, so one can get confused that "a lot" is also an adjective. Examples-

As noun- He had a lot of time to check the settings to ensure that he was perfect at the programming--he got so into it that he lost track of time and finished after the deadline.
Here, "a lot" is noun and "time" is the adjective.

As adverb- He danced a lot last night in the party.
"Danced" is a verb, and "a lot" modifies "danced". So, "a lot" used here is an adverb.

As adjective- A lot of people go to club on saturdays.
In the above sentence we have used "a lot of", in place of "a lot". The "of" in this sentence belongs to "of people".

This means "many" people when compared to few, not "an ample amount of people".
"Ample amount" is a relative value to expected quantity, on the other hand "many" and "few" are absolute value which does not dependent on expectations.

So, In linguistics, an adjective (abbreviated adj) is a word that modifies or describes the referent of a noun or noun phrase. Its semantic function is to alter the information provided by the noun.

Adjectives have long been considered one of the most important parts of speech in the English language, though they were previously lumped in with nouns. Certain words that were previously classified as adjectives, such as the, this, my, and others, are now classified as determiners.

Thus, "A lot" is a countable concept that means "to a large extent or degree." It can appear to describe the number of objects involved, the magnitude of an action's effect, and so on. so that, “a lot” is not an adjective, it is an adverb.

Note: We should not be confused between the phrase “a lot” and “a lot of” . “A lot of “ is an adjective while “A lot” is not eg- I have travelled a lot of places and discovered a lot of cultures. This is tricky but an interesting concept.