Talk:bad form

RFV

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I don't think this is attestable as a true adjective (vs attribute use of noun). DCDuring TALK 21:15, 23 July 2010 (UTC)

Well, it's certainly not just attributive use of the noun — if anything, I would say it's most often predicative. The problem is that form is not always countable, so predicative use can easily be read as straightforward use of the uncountable noun (much as how "getting there is hard work" doesn't turn "hard work" into an adjective); and bad is already an adjective, so something like "very bad form" is easily read as "{very bad} form". Honestly, I'm not sure what sorts of cites could confirm that this is an adjective, if it is. —Ruakh_TALK 01:26, 5 October 2010 (UTC)

Just stumbled on this; since it can be qualified by adverbs it should pass RFV as clear widespread use with very, with absolutely. However, I wouldn't object to some sort of rewrite to make clear what the distinction is. Mglovesfun (talk) 17:32, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

See Ruakh's comment above re "{very bad}". Besides, is absolutely bad form is absolutely sometimes "{is absolutely}...".​—msh210℠ (talk) 17:45, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

Why would one assume that the grammar was not "very" or "absolutely" modifying "bad" in the normal way that adverbs modify adjectives, as Ruakh said? We would need a cite of the "more bad form than" type or something like "a very bad form display" (whereas I would expect "a display of very bad form"). DCDuring TALK 17:54, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

How about "What is still more bad form is for a medical journal to air the political views or religious beliefs of its editor."? —Ruakh_TALK 22:30, 16 January 2011 (UTC)

As you (and others) have told me, this kind of example is not usually compelling, certainly not compared to "more bad form than". I find it a little surprising that only Websters 1913 has this (as a run-in at "form") among OneLook references. The usage examples are of nouns. DCDuring TALK 00:54, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

Cambridge Advanced Learners has this as a noun. DCDuring TALK 19:25, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

I do not challenge the legitimacy of this as a noun, but it seems to function as a simple Adj-Noun NP. First, it should be clear that it is not a set phrase, as "bad [adj] form" is possible for [adjs] like "journalistic", "pedagogical", "chopstick", "Usenet", to pick some from bgc that seem to have the same sense of "bad form". Second, I am having trouble finding instances of "bad form" being used as an attributive modifier (none at BNC, COCA, COHA, and TIME though each has instances of "bad form": 16, 111, 129, and 38, respectively). It is only among such instances that testing by "very" and "too" seems appropriate for distinguishing noun and adjective. The search for "very bad form" being used attributively on google seems very tedious and has not yet borne fruit. In those case we can then try to determine whether "very" modifies "bad" or "bad form". DCDuring TALK 20:32, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

Adjective RFV-failed. - -sche (discuss) 23:45, 6 August 2011 (UTC)