koordinative

Koordinative is an adjective meaning relating to coordination, especially in grammar and linguistics, where it describes constructions that connect units of equal syntactic status. A koordinative construction, or coordination, joins two or more constituents—words, phrases, or clauses—into a single syntactic unit. The linking elements are called conjuncts and are typically connected by coordinating devices such as coordinating conjunctions (and, or, but) or by punctuation (commas, semicolons).

Coordinations are generally characterized by symmetry: the conjuncts have parallel structure and comparable weight in interpretation. They differ from subordinate constructions where one unit depends on another. In English, common coordinators include and, or, but. Example sentences illustrate the range: bread and butter (word level); a red balloon and a blue kite (phrase level); She arrived late, and he left early (clause level).

Cross-linguistic variation exists: some languages require strict parallelism; others permit different word orders or affixes on each conjunct. Some languages use special marking to indicate each conjunct, while others rely on punctuation, intonation, or ellipsis to signal coordination.

Koordinative analyses are central to theories of syntax and sentence structure, and they interact with related phenomena such as asyndeton (omitting a conjunction) and gapping (omitting a repeated verb).

See also:

- Coordinating conjunction

- Coordination (linguistics)