A Word, Please: Lessons on commas from Netflix and skaters

There’s film on Netflix that piqued my interest. Here’s how “Mid90s” is described on the streaming service: “A lonely boy escapes his troubled home life by latching on to a group of older, skater kids.”

I’m intrigued.

How did the older kids get so skate? And is one of them skater than the others — you know, the skatest of the bunch?

English is weird. Punctuation is weird. And if you’re not careful with both, you can write something weird when you don’t mean to.

Let’s start with punctuation, in this case, the comma that singlehandedly messed up an otherwise fine show description.

A lot of people know that commas can go between adjectives in front of a noun: a nice, generous, thoughtful person. And, whether they think about it or not, they know that sometimes commas should not go between adjectives in front of a noun: a bright orange dress shirt. But few people know why, and even the experts struggle to explain it succinctly.

Here’s the Chicago Manual of Style: “As a general rule, when a noun is preceded by two or more adjectives that could, without affecting the meaning, be joined by ‘and,’ the adjectives are separated by commas. Such adjectives, which are called coordinate adjectives, can also usually be reversed in order and still make sense. If, on the other hand, the adjectives are not coordinate — that is, if one or more of the adjectives are essential to (i.e., form a unit with) the noun being modified — no commas are used.”

The Associated Press Stylebook casts it as how the adjectives “rank.”

“Use commas to separate a series of adjectives equal in rank. If the commas could be replaced by the word ‘and’ without changing the sense, the adjectives are equal: a thoughtful, precise manner; a dark, dangerous street. Use no comma when the last adjective before a noun outranks its predecessors because it is an integral element of a noun phrase, which is the equivalent of a single noun: a cheap fur coat.”

So while it’s unfortunate that there’s no clearer way of explaining this comma rule, at least you have two handy tests to choose from: try putting the word “and” between the adjectives, or try changing their order. If the sentence still makes sense, you need commas.

“Older and skater kids” is nonsense. So is “skater, older kids.”

When you write it, as the Netflix people did, “older, skater,” it implies that “skater” is an adjective on par with “older” — that their rank is the same, that they’re coordinate.

They’re not. “Skater” doesn’t just describe the kids, it defines them. And this isn’t just because “skater” is a noun. The same is true for older Hawaiian shirt and delicious tossed salad.

The other odd thing about English that Netflix’s copy reveals has to do with the “er” ending on “skater.” As a suffix, “er” has two meanings.

It can mean more, greater, better, etc., forming a comparative adjective. You’re smart, she’s smarter. You’re late, he’s later. You’re tall, they’re taller.

In this sense, “er” is what’s called an adjective suffix because it attaches to an adjective like tall, or it’s an adverb suffix because it attaches to an adverb like fast.

But “er” can also be a noun suffix, as it is in skater. The noun suffix form has nine possible definitions. It can be someone who does a thing: a skater, a seat filler, a jogger. It can mean to have something, for example a double-decker bus has double decks. It can also mean a native or resident of, like a New Yorker or a New Englander.

To avoid mistakes like Netflix’s, you don’t need to think about “er” suffixes. It’s the comma that’ll get you. Try moving your adjectives around or putting “and” between them. If you end up with nonsense like “skater older kids,” you know there’s no comma in “older skater kids.”

— June Casagrande is the author of “The Joy of Syntax: A Simple Guide to All the Grammar You Know You Should Know.” She can be reached at JuneTCN@aol.com.