Nouns

Nouns are the 'things' we are referring to when we communicate. That said, there are many different ways these nouns can be categorised.

Introduction

When we communicate with one another we are interested in who or what is doing something, and who or what is having something done to them.

These "whos" and "whats" are known as nouns, and there are many different types of them.

People, Places and Things

In general, we can place nouns into three broad categories: people, places and things.

Subjects and Objects

Grammatically, there is a big difference between a noun that is doing something within a sentence (the subject) and a noun that is having something done to it (an object).

In most English sentences, the subject comes before the verb (Jeff ate breakfast). Consequently, the object usually comes after the verb (Jeff ate breakfast).

That said, this order (known as the active voice) can be changed by a writer to the passive voice as a matter of style (Breakfast was eaten by Jeff).

Concrete and Abstract Nouns

We can think of nouns as both concrete (able to be seen, heard, felt, etc.) and abstract (concepts which exist in language only).

Consider the following examples.

Proper Nouns and Common Nouns

Nouns can refer to a unique person, place or thing (proper nouns), or to or all of the people, places or things to which that label refers (common nouns).

Proper nouns are recognisable by the uppercase (capital) letter at the beginning of each word, while common nouns use only lowercase.

Singular and Plural Nouns

Nouns can be singular (one) or plural (many).

Singular nouns become plural by adding an -s or -es .

However, there are some nouns which are spelt the same when they are both singular and plural.

Countable and Uncountable Nouns

Countable nouns are nouns which can be mathematically counted using adjectives of number (eg. one, two, several, many).

Uncountable nouns cannot be mathematically counted; however, their approximate quantity can be referred to using adjectives of quantity (eg. some, much)

Collective Nouns

A noun can refer to a group of more than one person or thing. This is known as a collective noun.

Consider the following examples.

It can be tricky to know whether to treat a collective noun as singular or plural.

In general, a collective noun is treated as a singular noun. However, we can treat a collective noun as plural if we are referring to the actions of individual members within a group.

Compound Nouns

Two or more words can be combined to form a compound noun.

Consider the following examples.

There are a couple of things to note about these examples.

The first is that not all of the components of a compound noun need to be nouns themselves. The first example above (snowfall) consists of a noun (snow) and a verb (fall), while the last example (hot dog) consists of an adjective (hot) and a noun (dog).

The second thing to note is that not all compound nouns form a single word. As seen in the examples, compound nouns can be one word (closed compound nouns), two words connected by a hyphen (hyphenated compound nouns) or two separate words (open compound nouns).

There is no specific rule for determining whether a compound noun should be closed, hyphenated or open—a dictionary or spell checker is the only way to be sure, although these can sometimes lag behind common usage.

That said, there is a general linguistic trend for compound nouns to shift from two words, to a hyphenated word, to a single word.

Gerunds

Some activities that we partake in are treated as nouns, even though they may look like verbs in the progressive form (-ing). These nouns are known as gerunds.

Consider the following examples.

Noun Phrases

Grammatically, we can refer to a noun, and all the words in a sentence that relate to this noun, as a noun phrase.

Consider the following sentences, in which the noun is only one word.

Such sentences are quite rare because a noun is usually accompanied by other parts of speech.

Grammatically, the bolded words in each of the examples above (including the earlier ones in which the noun is only one word) are treated as a single entity: a noun phrase.

There is effectively no limit to the number of words that can constitute a noun phrase. However, a noun phrase will always include a head noun to which all other words in that phrase relate.

Note the underlined head nouns in the following examples.

Because a noun phrase is treated as a single entity, it can be replaced by a single pronoun.

A noun phrase can be one word or it can be many; grammatically, however, it is always treated as a single entity within a sentence.

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Pronouns