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Adjective from verbs at active voice

English Language & Usage Asked by Ascor8522 on December 28, 2020

In English, verbs can be conjugated both in the active and passive voice.
It makes it possible to distinguish who is doing the action and who/what the action is done on/against.

e.g.

|--------------------|-----------------------|-----------------------------|
|                    | active voice          | passive voice               |
|--------------------|-----------------------|-----------------------------|
| infinitive         | to ride               | to be ridden                |
| present simple     | (the rider) rides     | (the horse) is ridden       |
| continuous present | (the rider) is riding | (the horse) is being ridden |
|--------------------|-----------------------|-----------------------------|

Also, the language makes it possible to turn verbs into adjectives, by adding the -able or -ible suffixes, to mean "that can be …".
But this only works for the passive voice.

Is there a specific suffix (or a word that can reproduce that) that can turn a verb into an adjective at the active voice, with the meaning of "that can …" instead of "that can be …"?

e.g.

|------------|------------------|-------------------------|
|            | active voice     | passive voice           |
|------------|------------------|-------------------------|
| infinitive | to ride          | to be ridden            |
| adjective  | (the rider is) ? | (the horse is) rideable |
|------------|------------------|-------------------------|

How would I say, with only one word, that the rider is able to ride a horse?

Edit:
I’ll give a bit more context. I’m a software engeneer and was looking for a way to name a file (short name for something that can do some thing). Found this question that is closely related to mine.
I think I’ll just go with "can" as a prefix for the verb (and "canBe" for more consistency). e.g. "canPrint" and "canBePrinted".

One Answer

There is no such word. We just use the appropriate noun.


The horse is rideable.

The woman is a rider.


The house is built.

The man is a builder.


Beyond that we would have to use a phrase, e.g.

The woman can ride.

The man can build.

Answered by chasly - supports Monica on December 28, 2020

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