This message was originally submitted by [log in to unmask] to the ATEG list For me, the most coherent way to talk about parts of speech is to describe (for students) the structural characteristics and functional roles of "base," or "prototypical," nouns, adjectives, etc., and then demonstrate that some words in sentences take on some of those characteristics but not all (they are not prototypical), while some take on all the characterisitics. And that's basically all that can be said. For instance: A prototypical adjective... [1] can occupy both these slots: The ___ actor seems very ___. (Try "tall") but some non-prototypical ("imperfect") adjectives can occupy only one or the other (e.g. main, alone) [2] can take comparative and superlative inflections: taller, tallest but not "mainer" or even "more main" Or take the prototypical noun. It will take the plural and possessive inflections; it will take certain words as immediate constituents (or noun markers), i.e.pre-determiner, determiner, quantifier, particularizer, adj., adjunct; it will function in certain roles (subject, object); it will take an initial stress (im' print, as opposed to the verb im print'), etc. It isn't necessary to "explain" words that have some but not all those characteristics; it is simply a characteristic of our language to derive words that do not have all the characteristic of the base categories. Or that have the characteristics of two categories, such as the adjunct: "tennis" in "tennis shoe" has features of both noun and adjective. There's no need to argue which it is. Participles, for example, are simply words that are non-prototypical; they have charateristics of verbs and adjectives but aren't prototypical forms of either (e.g. "lost" in "the key lost yesterday" is a non-prototypical verb because it doesn't have HAVE in front of it; it is a non-prototypical adjective because, even though it is only one syllable, it cannot take the -er inflection). I try to teach my students the underlying categories and functions, after which I urge them to enjoy the flexibility of the language without worrying about how to categorize problematic words. --Bill Murdick