In structures such as 'football manager', is 'football' a modifier or a complement of the head noun?

I thought I'd post this as it illustrates a problem often encountered on ELU.

In structures such as 'football manager', is 'football' a modifier or a complement of the head noun?

I've seen both terms used as if there were only one possible correct answer. However, I've come across widely differing definitions of both 'modify' and 'complement' as used in grammar. I believe that people stating baldly that this is either one or the other are assuming a grammar that they prefer, rather than giving a balanced overview.

Notice that I intend this question to explore the usage/s of the term 'modify' and of the term 'complement' in this context. There may be overlap with the question of which word-class 'football' fits into, but that decision hardly answers the question.

Solution 1:

Short answer

^{(Assuming that Modifiers and Complements exist ...)}

It's a Complement.

Here's some evidence, which will be explained in more detail in the longer answer. Firstly, the noun manager inherently implies that there is something being managed. This expectation is fulfilled by the noun football. This shows the tight semantic relationship we expect between Heads and their Complements. This observation is backed up by the fact that the noun manager derives directly from the verb manage. The thing being managed is an argument of the verb manage, and therefore appears as a Complement of the verb. As with many other deverbal nouns we would analogously expect the arguments of the noun manager to correspondingly occur as Complements of the noun, not as Modifiers. In addition, nouns which specifically have the thematic role of patient in relation to the activity indicated by the Head noun would often be expected to be able to occur either as a prehead Complement or, alternatively, as part of a post-head Complement headed by the preposition of:

• a football manager
• a manager of football
• a book collector
• a collector of books

In addition the word football must occur directly before the noun manager—any prehead Modifiers must come before the word football, not after it:

• an idiot football manager
• an overweight, second division football manager
• a second division, overweight, football manager
• *a football idiot manager
• *a football second division overweight manager
• *an overweight, football, second division manager

Lastly we can observe that football works badly with the anaphoric proform one if we want it to mean football manager

• I need a manager.
• I need a premier league one.
• I need a talented one.
• *I need a football one. (odd if not ungrammatical)

This is because one is taken to stand in for the Head noun and its Complements. We cannot then try and add another Complement to it. We could, however, modify it with an attributive Modifier as shown in the second and third examples.

Full answer

_{to be completed in installments ...}

1. An admission

First of all, I voluntarily stick my hands up and explain that many of my posts here arbitrarily—and incorrectly—refer to any prehead dependent of the noun in a noun phrase as a modifier. Mea maxima culpa. This is shoddy. The reasons for this errant behaviour are that a) it is often difficult to determine whether a prehead dependent of a noun is a modifier or a complement b) I normally don't care either way— I don't find the prehead dependents of nouns very sexy, unlike prepositions, determiners, verb phrase complementation, relative clauses and larger constructions in general c) my knowledge about the grammar in this area is not very robust d) I often can't tell, and so therefore, given a–c above, I ignore the distinction. So far, the only people who have ever noticed are the fellow posters BillJ and possibly Rathony too.

2.0 Complements versus Modifiers

2.1 Complements

OK, with that out of the way, we can have a look at what a Modifier is and what a Complement is. Well, roughly speaking, a Complement is a phrase which fills a special slot set up by another word or phrase in the sentence. So for example, the verb TEACH sets up a slot for the thing being taught, the Direct Object, and the people being taught, the so-called Indirect Object. These terms such as Direct Object, Indirect Object, Locative Complement and so forth are just more specific names for Complements of a verb. Prepositions take Complements too, often noun phrases which we can also sometimes describe as Predicative Complements or Objects. Adverbs can often take Complements either directly or indirectly as well. So for example, the infinitival clause to eat in one go fills a special slot set up by the adverb too in It was too big to eat in one go. Adjectives can take their own various sorts of Complements too; consider on chess in keen on chess or to leave in keen to leave.

So, all sort of words and phrases can set up these slots, and all sorts of words and phrases can fill them too. Sometimes Complements are obligatory and sometimes they aren't. Of course, it's nice and handy when Complements are obligatory, because it's easy to identify them. It is also, in such cases, easy to demonstrate how that word or phrase has a special relationship with the Head of the phrase. So, unfortunately, Complements are often construed as obligatory essential accompaniments to other words or phrases when we first start to learn about them. This isn't always the case. Let's revisit the verb TEACH:

• I teach.
• I teach English.
• I teach students.
• I teach students English.
• I teach English to students.

Here we see this verb taking no Complements, taking one Object, taking two Objects and taking an Object and a preposition phrase Complement. These different Complements are Complements because this verb sets up a special slot for them, not because they are obligatory.

Complements, of course, have other features. For example, they are usually selected by the word they are the Complements of. These Heads will allow certain types of Complements but not others. So for example, the adjective keen will select preposition phrases headed by the preposition on, but not ones headed by the preposition of:

• keen on spiders
• *keen of spiders (ungrammatical)

The verb inquire can take interrogative clauses as Complements, but not declarative ones:

• I inquired whether the elephants had left.
• *I inquired that the elephants had left. (ungrammatical)

Complements are thought of as being more tightly integrated into the phrases they occur in than Modifiers are. Whereas Complements are often required to be adjacent to the words that license them, Modifiers can often be moved further away from the phrases they modify or appear on either side of them. So if we see both Complements and Modifiers in the same phrase, as a rule of thumb, all other things being equal, we expect the Complements to be closer to the Head word than the Modifiers:

• Put it on the shop floor on Thursday.
• *Put it on Thursday on the shop floor. (awkward if not ungrammatical)

A sentence or phrase will often sound marked, awkward or ungrammatical if this does not occur. In the sentence above the Complement on the shop floor will ideally come closer to the verb put than the Modifier on Thursday.

Because Complements are more tightly integrated into the phrases they occur in than Modifiers, they are often obligatorily replaced when we use a proform, whereas Modifiers may be repeated or addended to such phrases:

• *I put my beer in the fridge and Bob did so in the cupboard. (ungrammatical)

• I drank my beer in the kitchen but Bob did so in the living room.

• *I am counting on their help, but I don't want you to do so on their help. (ungrammatical)

• I am counting on their help, but I don't want you to do so.

In the first sentence in the fridge is a Locative Complement. As the anaphoric proform do so includes the Locative Complement in the second clause in that example, we cannot then add a second Locative Complement, in the cupboard. In the second sentence, where in the kitchen is a Locative Adjunct (a Modifier), we can freely add another Locative Adjunct in the second clause, in the living room. In the last pair we see that the sentence is grammatical if we omit the Complement on their help after do so, and ungrammatical if we repeat it.

Lastly, semantically, Complements usually have a close relationship with the words that license them. Words inherently describe semantic relations between different things. So the verb PUT brings to mind a putter, a thing being put, and a location. It doesn't inherently involve any idea of time. So in Put it in the fridge tonight, we would not expect tonight to be a Complement of the verb put, but we would expect both it and in the fridge to be Complements, which as we have seen above, they are. The thing being put and the destination of that thing are suggested by the very use of the verb PUT. Similarly the noun collector also inherently implies that there are things which are collected and someone who collects them. The noun resignation implies a resigner. So in a collector of antique books, we would expect of antique books to be a Complement, and we would expect of the President to be a Complement in the resignation of the President. But we would not expect in the corner to be a Complement in the collector in the corner, because the noun collector does not inherently imply a location.

Because of semantic factors above we also expect Heads to impose semantic, as well as syntactic, selectional restrictions on their Complements. We can annoy elephants but not tables, unless we ascribe some sort of animacy to our tables for some reason. We don't expect such tight restrictions with Modifiers. One can do almost anything on Wednesday and almost anything pointlessly. And whereas the number of possible Complements is specified by the Head both semantically and syntactically, the number of Modifiers is not.

2.2 Modifiers

Modifiers are never obligatory. We can characterise them as syntactically extra elements. They are usually semantically extra too, in the sense that they are not automatically implied by the words or phrases that they modify. Unlike Complements, Modifiers are usually only loosely integrated into the larger phrases they occur in. Their position is often only loosely determined:

• I play foot ball [in the park][on Fridays][with my friends]
• I play football [with my friends][on Fridays][in the park]
• I play football [on Fridays][in the park][with my friends]
• [On Fridays] I play football [with my friends] [in the park]

As shown further above unlike Complements, modifiers are not obligatorily relaced when we use proforms to refer back to a larger phrase.

We can use various forms of cycle as an analogy for phrases here: unicycles, bicycles, tricycles, tandems and so forth. If we regard the frame of the cycle as the Head of a phrase or clause, then the Complements are all the things that fit into the different slots in the frame. So the frame dictates the size and number of wheels, saddles, handlebars and so forth (some of which may be optional, for example in the case of tandems) that the frame can take. These things are all Complements. You can't put the wrong Complements on the wrong frames. For example, a unicycle frame won't usually allow handlebars in the same way that an intransitive verb won't allow a Direct Object. Also you can't fit the wrong size parts into the wrong slots. So the stem of your handlebars must fit into the frame, for example. It cannot be too big or too small. So the frame puts restrictions on what can be slotted into it. In contrast, any lights, bells, mudguards, panniers, stickers and so forth are always optional extras. They are, to extend the metaphor, Modifiers. You can't ride your unicycle without a wheel, but a light is definitely an optional extra. Notice as well, that the bicylce frame puts very few selectional restrictions on the Modifiers available. You can stick lights, bells or horns on any cycle you want to, and any number of each as well—although admittedly things might get awkward if you do decide to use very many.

Solution 2:

There’s a difference: a football manager is a manager who works in the field (sport) of football. Or a "manager of football", if you prefer.

But "football" does not denote a property of the person referred to as "manager" as say "talented" or "useless" would in "A talented/useless football manager", where the adjectives "talented" and "useless" are clearly modifiers. If "football" were a modifier (like an adjective), it would readily combine with "one", as "talented" does in "get me a talented one", but with "football" you get the very odd *”get me a football one".

Solution 3:

This is exactly the kind of question that keeps grammarians wide awake and scrabbling far into the night. It is to be appreciated and savored.

It's a question that many dead-tree grammar books dodge and flee, leaving a trail of clearly adjectival egg timers and obviously adjunctive lawn mowers in their wake. When pressed, authorities like Warriner and Lunsford defer to "common usage" and move on - rapidly - leaving the field to puzzled pupils and curious grammarphiles.

A sampling of this kind of "sagacity":

In compound nouns, words double up to express a whole that is more than the sum of its parts. They can be made of common nouns (bus ride), proper nouns (Central Anatolia), or both (Galatia highlands). They can be "open compounds" (acid trip) or closed ones (daylight, slipstream). Compounding has been common throughout the history of English, but writers and their editors don't often agree on when and whether to splice words together. -Constance Hale, Sin and Syntax, 2013

Hale makes no mention of the possible adjectival nature of the nouns, and leaves off the concept of what commenters and answerers are calling complements, adjuncts or determiners, depending on their particular catechisms.

Nouns are sometimes used as adjectives.

sofa cushion hotel lobby bread pudding glass beads

When you are identifying parts of speech and you encounter a noun used as an adjective, label it an adjective. -John E. Warriner, English Grammar and Composition, 1982

Warriner calls them all adjectives, period.

Conscious of the way in which nouns merge over time - think of the drifting that brought taximeter cabriolet eventually into taxicab, thence later to taxi, cab ... and now Uber - I'd like to try to strike a sensible balance.

Having ducked the question numerous times in the classroom and in small-distribution print, let me rise out of the weeds to suggest that it depends on context.

A football manager is a noun modified by an adjective if he is presented in the semantic company of other sorts of managers.

Thus the football coach (different continent, different title, different game...) at Blather State College is adejectivally modified in a pamphlet extolling the virtues of the school' basketball, ice hockey, baseball, lacrosse, golf, swimming and full-contact origami coaches.

If, however, I describe Meghan as our football coach (we are strenuous adherents of Title IX) the word "football" is an adjunct (or complement - let's not be fussy) because it identifies her rather than distinguishing her among her fellow managers.

In attempting the distinction between adjective and complement, one has to look around and see if there are any other kinds of the thing named in sight.

If the noun has the field pretty much to itself, e.g., a lawn mower rusting in a shed devoid of any other kind of "mower," we'll call "lawn" a complement.

But when we see our plucky yellow egg timer alongside our oven timer, our kitchen clock and our stopwatch, we can safely call the "egg" an adjective.

Solution 4:

According to Herbst 2010: English Linguistics. A coursebook for Students of English, there are different models by different authors concerning determinative compounds. 'Football manager' is a determinative compound, because the first word defines the second one further.

Herbst himself gives 'killer shark' as an example, 'killer' being a complement, because it defines the subject, 'shark', further. So, in this case, 'football' would be a complement, 'manager' the subject.

According to Plag, Braun, Lappe and Schramm 2007: Introduction to English Linguistics, 'football' would be the modifier, and 'manager' the head.

Another model for the analysis of compounds is by Kastovsky. He distinguishes between determinant and determinantum (Kastovsky 2007: Vocabulary; Kastovsky 1982: Semantics and vocabulary) . When following this model, 'football' would be regarded as determinant, 'manager' as determinantum.