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From:
Craig Hancock <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Thu, 3 Mar 2011 21:03:16 -0500
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Bruce,
    The primary question, I think, was about how to handle commas in a
noun phrase. So our primary disagreement would be whether to follow
standard practices or whether to follow practices modeled on a theory
of cartographic order.
   I do tend to read discussions of language which routinely mix syntax,
cognition, and discourse. So I have no problem thinking of prototypical
adjectives as being gradable. Concepts like old, young, weak, strong,
cold, hot, wise, foolish are essentially a matter of degree. So it is
natural for the syntax to echo that with qualifiers like "so" and
"very" and "somewhat" and for there to be comparative and superlative
forms that help us understand what degree of oldness, coldness, and so
on might be involved. I admit that "blue" might not be quite so
prototypical as these, but it seems to me to have enough in common to
be thought of as an adjective. I would consider a phrase like "the deep
blue, strangely quiet sea" to include two adjective phrases. If we put
a comma after "deep," it would have three. These are important
distinctions. If that's the point you were trying to make, I'm right
with you. We can say "deeply blue," but I'm not sure about "strange
quiet" as adjective phrase (and not noun phrase), so that would seem to
mean "blue' seems to float a bit in how we conceive of it.
     I'm not sure what you mean by "natural selection" with compound
nouns. I think it's pretty well accepted that the meaning of words is
something that develops out of shared use. A term like "concentration
camp" can be thought of as having a meaning that we can access
because it is widely shared. Even terms like "wind erosion" and "soil
erosion" are only understandable because we share the knowledge base
behind them. (Erosion by wind. Erosion of soil.) A "tie breaker"
doesn't break neckties. A "floor lamp" is a stable enough concept to
have its own corner of the lamp store. To the extent they are stock
phrases, their meaning is not unique to the discourse context.
   Is cartographic order something that has been tested in a corpus study?
I'm curious about the source of the distinction. I would be careful
about using it with students interested in comma conventions, though,
because it seems quite different from prevailing practices. Prevailing
practices seem sensible to me.

Craig
 Craig,
> We can agree to disagree, but I think there is less disagreement than you
> have pointed out.  I have no trouble with "blue" as an adjective.  The
> point was that "old" is an adjective corresponding to the phrase "of age",
> but these do not have modifiers coming with them in a derivation like
> participles, for example.  There is a tendancy to ignore the fact that
> "blue" has its own modifiers.  I would think that a syntactic explanation,
> as with participles, would be enlightening.  In biology they call this
> adaptation to an environment.  There natural selection in evolution works
> as an explanation, which you seem to have accepted whole-heartedly with
> compound nouns.
>
> Comparative and superlative forms are not the touchstones they may seem to
> be.  I think these belong to derivational morphology, though here the
> derivation produces the syntax of adverbs (more, less) with it.  There are
> numerous adverbs with such forms and many adjectives without them.  But
> this is another subject that would require taking the adjective series
> even further afield.
>
> Bruce
>
> --- [log in to unmask] wrote:
>
> From: Craig Hancock <[log in to unmask]>
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: grammar question--adjective series and commas
> Date:         Thu, 3 Mar 2011 12:40:53 -0500
>
> Bruce,
>      We can certainly agree to disagree about a number of things. One of
> them , though, is that your principles for comma use are very much
> different from traditional practice. They seem to be based on the idea
> of cartographic order, which is not a widespread understanding. They may
> be better, but I don't think editorsd operate with those in mind.
>       "A" and "the" can be seen as tied to discourse. "He got the car"
> doesn't make any sense unless you and I share an understanding of what
> car we are talking about, either from shared understanding of the world
> OR from the discourse context.
>     I am not trying to dodge the issue with compound nouns. Some of
> those are very stable in the language. A tootbrush may once have been
> unusual, but now we all know already what it means. A barber shop is a
> kind of shop. Ten years ago, a dry board was a board that was dry. Now
> it is a particular kind of board. If you want to look at how meaning is
> built in the noun phrase, we should acknowledge that some categories are
> already established within the lexicon, others less so. I certainly
> wouldn't call a noun an adjective when it fits into that role. It is a
> noun acting like a modifier and it narrows the category down, sometimes
> in a cognitively and culturally stable way. I can go into a store and
> ask for steak knives, but I probably can't go in and ask for marshmellow
> knives. It may tell us what the knives are for, but not what kind of
> knife it is, at least not in the same way.
>      I would call ordinal and cardinal numerals part of the determiner
> system, but I didn't want to insist on that. Many grammars call them
> postdeterminers to distinguish them from ordinary adjectives. It seems
> to me that they are always part of the system that tells us which ones
> we are focused on, whereas the adjectives aren't always doing that. You
> may call it cartographic order; I'm much more comfortable thinking of it
> as part of the determiner system.
>      I still don't know why you think color cannot be an adjective. It
> certainly passes the syntactic tests. It has comparative and superlative
> forms. You can say "very blue" and "so blue," "bluer" and "bluest." I
> don't think of "age" in that way. High is an adjective, height a noun.
> Old is an adjective, age a noun. We can be higher, but not heighter,
> older but not ager, and so on. These seem to me tests that make 'old"
> and "blue" prototypical of adjectives, both in syntactic terms and in
> cognitive terms.
>     I don't know how you would explain the idea that soft embroidered
> hypoallergenic pillow is a "normal" order for pillow description or that
> it would therefor not require commas. That is a view I have never heard
> before and have never seen in a prescriptive grammar book. When I say it
> aloud, I place intonational marking between each of these. I can change
> the order. I can add ands. "I want a soft and embroidered and
> hypoallergenic pillow." "I want a hypoallergenic, soft, embroidered
> pillow."
>      Again, we can agree to disagree. I haven't heard of editors using
> cartographic order for editing decisions, but perhaps I am just unaware
> of it.
>
> Craig
>
>
> On 3/3/2011 8:38 AM, Bruce Despain wrote:
>> Craig,
>>
>> What you outline is all well and good.  Certainly some of the
>> terminology is not to my liking, but that is neither here nor there.
>> [The semantic function of determiners is one of "reference (to the real
>> world)," for example.]
>>
>> I believe the first point about compound nouns is a dodge.  When two
>> nouns are placed together in a single semantic unit, their syntax as
>> separate items usually becomes morphological.  Their semantic function
>> would usually be that of a classifying adjective, but their part of
>> speech does not thereby become adjective. Of course their ordering in
>> the noun phrase is not at all flexible.  Rarely do the parts of a
>> compound noun become separated in the syntax of a sentence.  (They may
>> be split by interjections, for example, but everything might.)
>>
>> I believe the point about the scalar nature of color making it an
>> adjective is mixing semantic and syntactic criteria.  Many scalar nouns
>> cannot thereby serve as adjectives.  A 37-year-old man has age, but
>> "age" is not the adjective that is used.  We may say, "He is 37" and
>> leave it at that.  This noun number becomes a descriptive predicate
>> (subject complement), which we might call an adjective, but the
>> adjective "old" or the noun "age" is nowhere to be seen.
>>
>> The point about ordinals and numerals being post-determiners did not
>> seem to distinguish whether you mean these adjectives to be part of the
>> determiner system or simply, as I might argue, those classifying
>> adjectivals that stand furthest from the noun modified.  They do exhibit
>> a cartographic ordering, so why not?
>>
>> I have no trouble with your sentence about the car with the descriptive
>> (non-restrictive) adjectives.  Their order is irrelevant in this
>> function and commas are appropriate.  My concern was with commas placed
>> in a series of classifying adjectives.  If I say. "I want black,
>> polished fenders on my car," I believe you want to classify the fenders,
>> not simply describe them.  The desciptive function is secondary because
>> they are here restrictive.  The cartographic order is unusual, thus
>> motivating the use of a comma.  In this function the other order of
>> appeal + color is more usual so that the comma would not be appropriate
>> in, "I want polished black fenders on my car."  However, there is the
>> added complication here that I mentioned in my previous message.  The
>> color may itself be modified with its own adjective so that "polished
>> black" as a kind of color (compound adjective) needs unification as a
>> single classifier.  I think that this would require a comma if it is the
>> car that is polished, not the black color.
>>
>> In your last example, the classifiers seem to be out of normal
>> cartographic order, "I want a soft, hypoallergenic, embroidered pillow
>> for that chair."  It seems that the comma-less order would be "I want a
>> soft embroidered hypoallergenic pillow for that chair." These last two
>> adjectives describing the kind of construction and the kind of material
>> out of which it is made, may fall in the same rank and thus require a
>> comma, though.  If the focus is on the fact that you want a pillow for
>> that chair, and that the qualities specified are descriptive, then the
>> better sentence would be secondary: "It should be soft, . . ., and
>> flexible, like language."  I believe that this would separate the
>> functions of the adjectives more clearly. But language in use is not
>> always logical.
>>
>> Bruce
>>
>> --- [log in to unmask] wrote:
>>
>> From: Craig Hancock<[log in to unmask]>
>> To: [log in to unmask]
>> Subject: Re: grammar question--adjective series and commas
>> Date:         Wed, 2 Mar 2011 20:09:24 -0500
>>
>> Bruce,
>>      I am a little bit lost. I think we come at this from distinctively
>> different perspectives, so it may be our terminology is getting in the
>> way. I'll go into more detail about how I see it without necessarily
>> thinking of this as argument.
>>      To me, the determiners (and related words) function to ground the
>> noun
>> within a discourse context, essentially identifying which member(s) of
>> the group we are talking about. That's why it's so hard to define "a"
>> and "the." They have no meaning outside of their discourse function.
>> Other true determiners would be the demonstratives, possessive
>> pronouns, or possessive nouns because they fill the same slot.
>>     "All the first seven job applicants were qualified." "All" is
>> predeterminer," "the" determiner, and "first" and "seven"
>> postdeterminers. All those are frozen into position. This is not a
>> stable subset of "applicant" or "job applicant," but a group that makes
>> sense only within this particular context.
>>      "job" is a noun modifier, and here, I think we might agree, we
>> definitely have a subset of "applicant". To do that truly, it ought to
>> be a culturally accepted subset. In other words, a "job applicant" is
>> a pretty stable subset. A "floor" lamp is a stable subset of lamps. If
>> I decided I want to buy a "cabin lamp," though, meaning a lamp for my
>> cabin, I don't think we can think of it as a subset. I don't think
>> there's a culturally understood notion of what a "cabin lamp" is all
>> about. Maybe propane or kerosene? Still, the noun modifiers are also
>> somewhat frozen in position, next to the head. I don't think of "blue"
>> as just a noun, by the way, because it is scalar. One flower can be
>> bluer than another. One applicant can't be "jober" than another.
>> That's a mildly secondary issue.
>>      Between these groups, the determiners (including pre and post
>> determiners) and the noun modifiers, some of which are almost like
>> compound nouns in being somewhat cognitively stable, communally shared
>> subsets, come the true adjectives, which are generally both movable
>> and coordinate. They may also have a role in helping someone identify
>> which one or ones you are talking about, but that will vary by
>> context, and it shouldn't, at least in my mind, influence whether or
>> not we use commas.
>>      These aren't all just in predicate noun phrases. Consider for
>> example
>> "I bought a Mustang, drove it home, parked it in the driveway, looked
>> out the window, and admired its black, polished fenders in the warm
>> afternoon sun.  To me, "black," "polished," and "warm" are adding
>> additional descriptive information. We already know which fenders and
>> which sun are in discourse focus. That's not true if I say "I want
>> black, polished fenders" or "polished, black fenders" "on my car." I
>> would use commas in both instances.
>>     When we have a compound series of three or more (with "and" or
>> "or"),
>> we always intonationally mark the compounded elements as we go. When
>> the "and" or "or" comes in at the end, it does so retroactively. The
>> comma between these movable, coordinate adjectives mirrors an
>> intonation marking in speech. That's why it is such a good test to put
>> "and" (or "or") between them.
>>      "I want a soft, hypoallergenic, embroidered pillow for that chair."
>> It
>> seems to me that the characteristics most salient for pillows are
>> culturally influenced. None of these would be salient for a car. I can
>> change their order or replace the comma with "ands" and not
>> significantly change the meaning.
>>
>> Craig
>>
>>
>>
>> Craig,
>>
>>   I said nothing of describing until I brought in restrictive
>>> and non-restrictive clauses that sometimes separate classification
>>> from
>>> identification.  I did mention hyponymic identification or the
>>> identification of a class, and you are right.  The adjectives that
>>> modify
>>> a noun in predicate position may all be brought into the
>>> indentification
>>> role, but it is the class of the subject that is being identified.
>>> They
>>> still classify the noun vehicle in your examples.  The distinction of
>>> the
>>> roles of classification, indentification, and description (both
>>> restrictive and non-restrictive) can result in a very slippery set of
>>> definitions.  The adjectives and phrases that are built up can
>>> eventually
>>> involve them all.
>>>
>>   Bruce
>>> --- [log in to unmask] wrote:
>>>
>>> From: Craig Hancock
>>> To: [log in to unmask]
>>> Subject: Re: grammar question--adjective series and commas
>>> Date: Wed, 2 Mar 2011 09:15:22 -0500
>>>
>>> Bruce,
>>>      The distinction between identifying and describing is not so easy
>>> to
>>> pin down, and it would certainly be context dependent.
>>>
>>> "I want a fast, classy looking, fuel efficient vehicle."
>>> "The Zebra X is a fast, classy looking, fuel efficient vehicle."
>>> In the first example, we have three identifying features. In the
>>> second,
>>> all are describing.
>>> I would use the same commas for both.
>>>
>>> Craig
>>>
>>> On 3/2/2011 7:03 AM, Bruce Despain wrote:
>>
>>   Peter,
>>
>>   Notice the
>>> difference between
>>   1. The big blue car
>>   2. The tall, massively
>>> muscled wrestler
>>   In (1) the classifiers are lined up in cartographic
>>> order: size, color; in (2) both modifiers relate to size.  Hence the
>>> comma
>
>>> is used.
>>   The idea with classifiers is that once one is used the noun
>>> is may be identified; additional classifiers of the same sort do not
>>> further identify the item.  If classifiers of a different sort are
>>> applied, then the item becomes better or more narrowly identified.  We
>>> come to be dealing with a smaller or more restricted class of items.
>>> This
>>> makes the comma unnecessary.
>>   When identifiers are piled on, the item
>>> has already been identified and further modification of the same sort
>>> is
>>> non-restrictive. This is often the distinction between relative
>>> clauses
>>> introduced by "that" (identification) and "which, who"
>>> (non-restrictive).
>>> The former connective may be appropriate when the item is not
>>> identified,
>>> whereas the latter, when it already is.  This may be a means of
>>> clarifying
>>> classification.
>>   3. The blue car that is big (a big blue car)
>>   4. The
>>> big car that is blue (a big car that happens to be blue)
>>   5. The blue car
>>> which is big (a blue car that happens to be big)
>>   6. The big car which is
>>> blue (same as (4))
>>   So, when the adjectives are classifying, the
>>> restrictive vs. non-restrictive contrast helps to clarify the
>>> cartographic
>>> order.
>>   Sometimes the modifiers are are even more narrow in their
>>> classificatory function.  In (7) the adjectives modify the color, which
>>> is
>>> a noun being used transitorily as an adjective.
>>   7.  The deep dark
>>> blue car
>>   The noun blue is used attributively to classify the car.  The
>>> adjective dark is used to classify the color, not the car.  Then the
>>> adjective deep is used to classify the shade of dark blue, not the
>>> blue
>>> car.  Of course, the question of commas or shifting of rank is not
>>> applicable here.  In (8) the adjective deep might be interpreted
>>> either
>>> way.  In this case the comma might be helpful.
>>   8.  The deep dark blue
>>> water (the water that is a deep dark blue)
>>   9.  The deep, dark blue water
>>> (the dark blue water that is deep)
>>   So, even though the cartographic
>>> order in (9) is size then color, the comma has a different function
>>> [zeugmatic homonymic hyponym].  This is the list-comma.  It helps to
>>> group
>>> items with their modifiers.  When the list-comma is left out before
>>> the
>>> final item on a list, it is called the Oxford comma.  My own
>>> disposition
>>> is to use the Oxford comma, even when sometimes the presence of a
>>> conjunction would seem to make it redundant. But whether or not
>>> authors
>>> use the Oxford comma, I think it is important that they be consistent.
>>>
>>   Bruce
>>   P.S.  Sorry for the oxymoronic term, but I couldn't resist
>>> --- [log in to unmask] wrote:
>>>
>>> From: "Peter H. Fries"
>>> To: [log in to unmask]
>>> Subject: Re: grammar question--adjective series and commas
>>> Date: Mon, 28 Feb 2011 23:51:36 -0700
>>>
>>>
>>   I haven't read this discussion systematically, but in the messages
>> that
>>> I have read, it seems to me that the discussion has not directly
>>> addressed
>>> the fact that inserting a comma into a series of modifiers (not just
>>> adjectives) within a noun phrase may be significant, not merely a
>>> matter
>>> of convention. Some have mentioned the possibility that a comma might
>>> indicate a conjunction of adjectives as in
>>>
>>>
>>   a. _The big blue car_  or _the tall, massively muscled wrestler_
>>   Can
>>> be paraphrased as
>>   b. _the big and blue car_ and _the tall and massively
>>> muscled wrestler_
>>   (I apologize for my made-up examples. I'm away from
>>> my files and can't recover them.)
>>>
>>   But there is a consequence of this interpretation for the ways that
>>> these adjectives function within the whole. The examples in a, with no
>>> comma or conjunction, may be interpreted as restrictive* modifiers in
>>> which 'blue' modifies (restricts the reference of) 'car' and 'big'
>>> modifies (restricts the reference of) 'blue car'. **
>>   But such a
>>> restrictive interpretation is impossible when commas or a conjunction
>>> is
>>> present.
>>   The adjectives in example b both modify 'car' ('wrestler')
>>> directly.
>>>
>>   This implication allows people to insert commas between elements of
>> the
>>> noun phrase which clearly do not function in the same way within the
>>> noun
>>> phrase. In this way the comma is not equivalent to the conjunction
>>> 'and'.
>>>
>>   For example, if in a text I mention that there are two approaches to
>> a
>>> problem, of which one is a true application of a particular theory, I
>>> may
>>> follow up that assertion with a description of each approach, beginning
>>> my
>>> discussion of the true application with the phrase
>>   _The first, true
>>> application of this theory…_
>>   The presence of the comma, by preventing
>>> a restrictive reading, allows me to say that this theory is the first
>>> that
>>> I will mention, not the first one that occurred (as would be implied
>>> by
>>> the wording _the first true application of this theory…_
>>
>>   Note:
>>> *Some may object to my use of the term 'restrictive' here. I
>>> don’t
>>> particularly stand behind it. It's the best word I could think of
>>> without
>>> spending considerable time searching for one. In any case my point is
>>> that
>>> there is a difference in potential relation among the various
>>> modifiers
>>> when there is a comma and when there is no comma.
>>   ** A number of
>>> people have mentioned the normal sequence of adjectives. As some of
>>> you
>>> have said, generally the modifiers that appear closer to the head noun
>>> are
>>> considered related more closely to the head. (It seems to me that
>>> Robert
>>> Dixon discussed in some detail an elaborated sequence for modifiers
>>> within
>>> the noun phrase, based on meaning types and the usual relations to the
>>> nouns they modify. Unfortunately I can't remember either the details
>>> of
>>> his approach or reference for it.)
>>   Peter
>>>
>>   On Sun, Feb 27, 2011 at 12:44 PM, Craig Hancock  wrote:
>>   Bruce,
>>>    In reworking your examples in my mind, I find it easy to find
>>> versions
>>> that seem just as natural as the version you present as the most
>>> natural. Everything might depend on what you were looking for in a
>>> rug.
>>> For the color scheme and size of a room, it might be most important
>>> that it be large and green. For an employee, you  might want someone
>>> smart and reliable and not care so much about age or size. You mention
>>> that the work is being done in Italy. Do they propose it for Italian?
>>> For all languages? What would the basis of that be? What would they
>>> say
>>> about a language like Spanish, where the adjectives come after the
>>> noun?
>>>    The usual explanation for English is that we have pre-deteminers,
>>> determiners, post-deteminers, true adjectives, noun modifiers, the
>>> head
>>> noun, and then postnominal groups (like prepositional phrases.)
>>>    Dick gives a good example of an adjective noun combination (sweet
>>> tooth) that constitutes a set phrase, but for the most part, those are
>>> noun noun combinations, like ice cream or death wish or rest stop.
>>>    Traditional grammar often lists "movable or coordinate" adjectives
>>> as
>>> requiring commas, the test being whether you can change the order
>>> without significantly altering meaning and whether it feels OK to put
>>> an "and" between them. Generally, this is true of the true adjectives
>>> (the truly scalar terms). Of course, they want to call everything that
>>> modifies a noun an adjective, which makes it necessary to come up with
>>> a sub-category.
>>>    You leave me wondering how they tested for this scale and whether
>>> it
>>> might be language or culture specific and whether it would hold true
>>> no
>>> matter what it was you were describing.
>>>
>>>
>>> Craig
>>>
>>>
>>> Scott,   Some recent work in this area (in Italy) calls the natural
>>> order
>>>> of adjectives in the noun phrase its cartography.  The grammarian
>>>> tries
>>>> different orders to determine the natural order of classification.
>>>> Hence
>>>> you might try to make a maximal stretch of adjectives like:   She
>>>> sold
>>>> her
>>>> a certain expensive charming large square ancient green hand woven
>>>> Armenian carpet at auction.   In this noun phrase there is a ranking
>>>> of
>>>> the eight features: origin, style, color, age, shape, size, appeal,
>>>> and
>>>> value. The the possible adjective orders map to a scalar value of
>>>> rank.
>>>> Such adjectives as classify measures, e.gg., capacity, weight,
>>>> volume,
>>>> length, width, etc., might all share the same rank as size.  Examples
>>>> of
>>>> some even farther from these eight are: sixteenth, equal, similar,
>>>> chief,
>>>> which come first (opposite order as given).  The investigator tries
>>>> different orders for pairs of adjectives and determines what the most
>>>> natural ranking is a step at a time.  When two adjectives fall in the
>>>> same
>>>> rank, they characterize it as belonging to that particular class.  If
>>>> the
>>>> order is not natural, or the adjectives fall into the same rank, then
>>>> a
>>>> comma is required; sort of like a pause to adjust the thinking
>>>> relative
>>>> to
>>>> their classification.     In my paraphrastic grammar I call this
>>>> adjective
>>>> accumulation.  The structure of the noun phrase is recursively
>>>> left-branching.  There is a similar phenomenon with the natural
>>>> ordering
>>>> of adverbials, but in a right-branching structure.  Just for fun I
>>>> made
>>>> up
>>>> a very long sentence with both kinds of accumulation (not advisable,
>>>> but
>>>> kinda fun):   "The unique $46,000 92 degree hot uncomfortable large
>>>> 5-foot
>>>> by 5-foot by 15-foot two ton almost 12 year old broken-down square
>>>> open
>>>> deep dark green American steel Hummer was driven flawlessly by a
>>>> professional at 6 miles an hour and 3 thousand revolutions per minute
>>>> for
>>>> a dozen miles on Route 66 from Albuquerque to the junction twice for
>>>> four
>>>> hours on Monday from 8:00 a. m. till noon."    Bruce
>>>>
>>>> --- [log in to unmask] wrote:
>>>>
>>>> From: Dick Veit
>>>> To: [log in to unmask]
>>>> Subject: Re: grammar question--adjective series and commas
>>>> Date: Fri, 25 Feb 2011 23:05:07 -0500
>>>>
>>>> Scott,
>>>>
>>>> Consider the difference between these two:
>>>>    my troublesome, sweet sister my troublesome sweet toothIn 1, both
>>>> "troublesome" and "sweet" modify "sister." My sister is troublesome
>>>> but
>>>> sweet.
>>>> In 2, "sweet" modifies "tooth," and "troublesome" modifies "sweet
>>>> tooth."
>>>> My sweet tooth is troublesome.
>>>>
>>>> When two or more adjectives (as in 1) modify a noun in parallel, they
>>>> are
>>>> separated by commas. When one adjective modifies a phrase that
>>>> contains
>>>> an
>>>> adjective (as in 2), no comma is used.
>>>>
>>>> Other examples:
>>>>    a tall, dark, handsome stranger              [tall&amp;amp; dark
>>>> &amp;amp;
>>>> handsome] stranger
>>>>   the best inexpensive Italian restaurant     the [best [inexpensive
>>>> [Italian restaurant]]]
>>>> Dick
>>>>
>>>>   On Fri, Feb 25, 2011 at 12:38 PM, Scott Woods  wrote:
>>>>      Dear List,   The following phrases seem different to me:   my
>>>> beautiful gray Persian cat   my large black leather coat   my large
>>>> gray Persian cat   my beautiful black leather coat   my old sad mangy
>>>> cat   my sweet old Irish grandmother   my beautiful Irish linen
>>>> tablecloth   Some of these need commas between some of the
>>>> adjectives,
>>>> but others seem not to. Do you agree? How can this be explained?
>>>> Thanks,   Scott Woods
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>>> Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Peter H. Fries
>>>  From December 20, 2010 to May 1, 2011
>>>    3661 N. Campbell Ave
>>>    Box 290
>>>    Tucson AZ 85719
>>>
>>> Phone: 520-529-0824
>>> Cell:  989-400-3764
>>>
>>>
>>>  From May 1, 2011 to December 2011
>>> Box 310
>>> Mount Pleasant MI 48804
>>>
>>> Phone:  989-644-3384
>>> Cell:      989-400-3764
>>>
>>> Email:  [log in to unmask]
>>>
>>> Web page:    [among 'emeritus faculty']
>>>
>>>
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>>   Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/
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>>   Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/
>>
>> To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web
>> interface at:
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>> Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/
>>
>>
>
> To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface
> at:
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>
> Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/
>
>
>

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