limiting adjectives vs possessive adjectives

[Fred Ridder]

Yes, there are restrictive [and non-restrictive] adjectives, which is what I assume you are referring to as "limiting adjectives" (a term I failed to find in any of my handy grammar/linguistics references).

But I don't think that's what we are dealing with here in the non-possessive case, because I don't believe we're dealing with adjectives at all. 

Most people remember that adjectives modify nouns, but forget that they are not the *only* things that modify nouns. In some cases verbs modify nouns (e.g., the sitting president), and in many cases -- particularly in technical writing -- nouns modify nouns. Nouns that modify nouns are referred to as "attributive nouns" or "noun adjuncts". They almost always appear before the noun they modify (an attributive or prepositive position) and they typically identify a property or attribute of the noun that follows rather than directly modifying the noun itself. 

The classical example of an attributive noun phrase in English is "chicken soup". Both words are nouns, but it is undeniable that the first noun modifies our understanding of what the second noun represents. Exactly what the relationship is varies widely; the second noun could be made from the first (e.g., chicken soup), intended for the first (e.g., user manual), composed of the first (e.g., butterfly migration), dependent on the first (e.g., church wedding) -- basically any semantic relationship other than simple possession by. And you can string a bunch of them together without any of the usual concerns about commas in adjective series. (E.g., The chicken soup tureen ladle handle was covered with schmaltz.)

Both "user manual" and "butterfly migration" fit this pattern. Both 
"user" and "butterfly" are nouns that modify the sense of the nouns that
 follow them. And they are unlike adjectives because they cannot be used
 predicatively. 

-FR

From: craigede at hotmail.com
To: shmuelw1 at gmail.com; framers at lists.frameusers.com
Subject: limiting adjectives vs possessive adjectives
Date: Mon, 16 Mar 2015 13:38:33 -0500




Shmuel,

In an earlier post on this topic I pointed out that in English we have adjectives of varying types, two of which are:

possessive adjectives
limiting adjectives

User manual is a example of the latter and limits the intended audience.
Another example of this is "butterfly migration" which limits the scope of those things migrating.

Non-native speakers often miss this distinction and say things like "butterflies migration".

My wife is a native Spanish speaker and she claims Spanish does not allow such limiting adjectives instead saying "the migration of the butterfly". (Note the singular butterfly, mimicking the singular user in English.)

Putting "butterfly migration" into google translate results in "migración de la mariposa" in Spanish. (Not that that proves anything.)

Craig


From:
 Shmuel [mailto:shmuelw1 at gmail.com] 

Sent: Sunday, March 15, 2015 7:19 AM

To: Craig, Alison; hessiansx4; Framers

Subject: Re: User's manual vs. User manual


 

We use User’s Manual. User’s Manual is the manual for the User. How do explain the name User Manual? If it means the same thing, isn't it missing the "apostrophe s"?




--

Shmuel Wolfson

Technical Writer

052-763-7133




 		 	   		  

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