# EN: email scams / scam emails - nouns used as adjectives



## A-class-act

"_...we bring you important information to help subscribers avoid *email scams*,..."
I'm wondering why in *email scams*,scams came the second,it should be in the first place before *email*,because "*scams*"is An adjective for *email* and in English adjectives come first?
Thats what I know.
http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=1276912
In that thread they translate email scams by emails frauduleux;
The fact of matter that I don't get why,and I'm waiting for someone to explain to me further.
_


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## Ellea1

Hello,

That's true that adjective come before the nouns, but there are exceptions and sometimes you may find them after the nouns.

Otherwise maybe "fraudes par courriels"???

Anyway, I'm also really curious why "email scams" and not the other way around.


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## SteveD

No, in your sentence, "scam" is a noun.

What kind of scams are they?  They are email scams.  "Email" is a noun-adjective here.

http://www.wordreference.com/enfr/scam


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## A-class-act

Thank you SteveD,Could you bring some further explanations?
I see look up scams before I post my question,I got nothing for that I asked.


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## SteveD

A scam is "escroquerie", "arnaque" etc.

http://www.spamsquad.be/fr/fiches/fiche06.html

An email scam is one perpetrated by email. ("email" is the adjective; "scam" is the noun)

A scam email is an email which involves a scam. ("scam" is the adjective; "email" is the noun)

Does this help?


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## Ellea1

Oh dear! This is the first time that I have heard of a  noun-adjective.

So email scam is "email (courriel) frauduleux"
and scam email "un email (courriel) implicant une arnaque"


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## Maître Capello

Not quite… As Steve explained:

_email scams_ = les escroqueries par courriel
_ 
scam emails_ = les courriels frauduleux / qui sont des escroqueries


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## Ellea1

Ok, got it now


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## moustic

Ellea1 said:


> This is the first time that I have heard of a  noun-adjective.



A noun used as an adjective :

race horse = cheval de course
horse race = course de chevaux


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## Keith Bradford

Ellea1 said:


> Oh dear! This is the first time that I have heard of a noun-adjective...


 
It may be the first time you've heard the word (I'd call them adjectival nouns) but I'm sure you know the phenomenon.

In English almost any noun can be used as an adjective. E.g. _Table leg, traffic accident, chestnut hair, trouser pocket, toy boy, book shop..._

They follow the usual rules for English adjectives: come before the noun and have no plural.

The same thing exists in French, though less common, as in _cheveux châtain, service ventes_... In French, of course, they come after the noun.


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## A-class-act

SteveD said:


> A scam is "escroquerie", "arnaque" etc.
> 
> http://www.spamsquad.be/fr/fiches/fiche06.html
> 
> An email scam is one perpetrated by email. ("email" is the adjective; "scam" is the noun)
> 
> A scam email is an email which involves a scam. ("scam" is the adjective; "email" is the noun)
> 
> Does this help?


Does this help?!!
Are you kidding;of course it helps,thank you a lot to response for the second time to give me further explanations.
And I thank you all.
Merci merci merci merci merci.....beaucoup pour vous tous"Maître Capello,Keith Bradford,Moustic,Ella1,Who was like me waiting for explanations."
Just so you know,for a long time I had that problem,I mean *adjectival nouns,*and that thread urges me to open that thread,my question wasn't really about the scams email but about that tiny problem.
Thanks again for you help.



Maître Capello said:


> Note quite… As Steve explained:
> 
> _email scams_ = les escroqueries par courriel
> _
> scam emails_ = les courriels frauduleux / qui sont des escroqueries


By the way,We can't say email*s* scam*s*/scam*s* email*s*,I mean it to put'em all in the plural?


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## moustic

No plural for adjectives!

You don't say "blue*s* eyes", do you?  ;-)


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## SteveD

A-class-act said:


> By the way,We can't say email*s* scam*s*/scam*s* email*s*,I mean it to put'em all in the plural?


 
One email scam

Two email scams

One scam email

Two scam emails

You could say, "Two emails' scams" and "Two scams' emails" (note the possessive apostrophe after the "s").

The first one refers to scams "belonging" to two emails and the second one refers to emails "belonging" to two scams.


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## A-class-act

Merci beaucoup SteveD.


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## Keith Bradford

SteveD said:


> ...
> You could say, "Two emails' scams" and "Two scams' emails" (note the possessive apostrophe after the "s")...


 
You could but I wouldn't, and I certainly wouldn't recommend it to beginners - they have difficulty enough with apostrophes as it is.

My broad rule: apostrophes are for making possessives of people, not of e-mails.


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## CapnPrep

"Nouns used as adjectives" is a useful description, but it suggests that these nouns have somehow _become_ adjectives, and that is not correct. The same word can have different functions in different contexts, but its category (or _nature_ in French) doesn't necessarily change.

In _e-mail scams_ and _scam e-mails_, and in KB's French example _service ventes_, or _réseaux Internet_, all of the words are nouns.* It's just that in both languages (but more easily in English than in French, as KB pointed out), one noun can modify another noun.


A-class-act said:


> By the way,We can't say email*s* scam*s*/scam*s* email*s*,I mean it to put'em all in the plural?


As the others have said, no, not really. But it's not because the first word is an adjective (again, it is still a noun). It is possible for a plural noun to modify another noun. You can find some examples in this thread:
*FR: star wars / stars war *
For me, a _scams e-mail_ could be an e-mail about scams. For example, _Your chain letters e-mail was very useful, but your scams e-mail contained a virus!

_*KB's other French example should be _cheveux châtain*s*_, because _châtain(e)(s)_ is in fact an adjective.


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## SteveD

Keith Bradford said:


> You could but I wouldn't, and I certainly wouldn't recommend it to beginners - they have difficulty enough with apostrophes as it is.
> 
> My broad rule: apostrophes are for making possessives of people, not of e-mails.


 
Quite.  "Emails' scams" etc are very unlikely constructions but nevertheless, gramatically correct.  However, use of apostrophes for people only is rather limiting:

The dog's ears
The dogs' ears

for example.


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## Keith Bradford

Sorry, Cap'n Prep, I couldn't disagree with you more. 
The definition of an adjective is very precisely "a word which modifies a noun" - these are adjectives in their function in the sentence, whatever their basic meaning was. You might as well argue that _table_ isn't a verb in the sentence: _The chairman tabled a proposal._
I can't find corroboration of my assertion about _châtain_, so I'll change it to _marron. _Or _lilas,_ or _indigo._ The principle's the same, i.e. that these adjectival nouns exist in French too.


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## CapnPrep

I am afraid that the parts of speech cannot be defined "very precisely" using just five or six words. A "word which modifies a noun" can be an adjective, an article, an adverb, a preposition, a verb, … or another noun. The _function_ of a word can give us some clues about its category, but the question can only be decided based on morphological and syntactic criteria. _Tabled_ is obviously a verb because it carries tense marking, undergoes passivization, can be coordinated with other verbs, etc.

In _scam e-mail_, the word _scam_ has no comparative or superlative form, does not allow other kinds of degree modification (_too_, _very_), cannot be coordinated with an adjective, cannot appear before an adjective, and cannot appear after the noun. All of these properties make it different from a word like _long_:


a longer / *scammer / *more scam e-mail
a very long / *very scam e-mail; a long enough / *scam enough e-mail
a long and funny e-mail / a long, but funny, e-mail; *a scam and funny e-mail / *a scam, but funny, e-mail
a long, funny e-mail / *a scam, funny e-mail
The e-mail was long / *scam.
Not all adjectives are as well-behaved as _long_, but if a word fails all of these tests, as _scam_ does, then it cannot be an adjective. Furthermore, you may or may not accept _scams e-mail_, but the fact remains that the first noun in a *noun-noun compound* can carry plural marking, which is another clear indication that it cannot be an adjective.


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