I think that two tests for coordinates are 1. the word "and" can be placed
between those adjectives and 2. they can be moved around:

"The little green bottle" has two cumulative adjectives.  "One" would not
write "the green little bottle."

 Christine Gray

-----Original Message-----
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar
[mailto:[log in to unmask]]On Behalf Of Kent Johnson
Sent: Tuesday, March 02, 2004 10:59 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: coordinate or cumulative? (emergency)

I had a mini-rebellion in my 090 Intro to Writing class yesterday. We are
covering punctuation, and a few students demanded to know exactly why the
adjectives in the following sentence should not be treated as coordinate:

>He wanted the red convertible Porsche.

I explained that "convertible" was a noun functioning as an adjective and
that therefore "convertible Porsche" should be regarded as a noun phrase
unit. But is this the right (or complete) explanation? For example, in the
sentence,

>She wanted the large, silk purse.

"silk" is an adjectival noun which could, it seems, be treated as coordinate
with "large" (its quality of silkiness) *or* as belonging to "purse" (like
"living" would to "room," say). Does this come down to a matter of subtle
emphasis, or is there some kind of "rule" to which one can point more
inquiring students? The textbooks I've seen more or less treat the
punctuation of adjectives as a closed and shut case, but it does seem there
is some ambiguity involved.

Thanks for any responses before my class with my independent-thinking
students tomorrow, Wednesday, at 3 pm Central Time. I promised them an
answer.

Kent

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