Nouns

Nouns refer to persons, animals, places, things, or ideas. Nouns encompass most words used in the English vocabulary, and there are several different types of nouns, including common nouns, proper nouns, concrete nouns, abstract nouns, and collective nouns. It is important to understand how types of nouns are formed since different rules apply to different noun types.

Types of nouns

Proper nouns differ from common nouns in that proper nouns refer to specific names of a person, place, or thing. Proper nouns always begin with a capital letter.

Common nouns are words used to denote general items. There are three types of common nouns: concrete nouns, abstract nouns, and collective nouns.

Concrete nouns

Concrete nouns are physical things that can be identified through one of the five senses (taste, touch, sight, hearing, or smell).

Abstract nouns

Abstract nouns are non-physical things that cannot be identified through one of the five senses (taste, touch, sight, hearing, or smell). Generally, it refers to ideas, qualities, and conditions.

Collective nouns

Collective nouns are words that represent a group of people, animals, or things. Collective nouns can be either plural or singular. However, it is more common to use collective nouns as singular nouns.

All sentences should have a subject (person, place, or thing that performs the action), and the subjects in sentences are always nouns or pronouns.

Nouns can be used as objects in sentences, both direct objects and indirect objects.

Direct objects

The direct object of a verb is the thing being acted upon. The direct object can be located by finding the verb and asking, “What or whom is being impacted?

(The girl loves whom? Her nanny)

(Whom did the university president award? The best students.)

Indirect objects

The indirect object is the recipient or beneficiary of the action. The indirect object can be located by finding the verb and asking, “For whom or to whom is this action directed?”

(I made what? A sculpture. For whom? My sister)

(Let’s bring what? Breakfast in bed. To whom will we bring it? Our parents.)

Subject and Object Complements

Subject complements

Subject complements are words or phrases that follow a linking verb (a verb used to link a subject to a new identity or description) and identify or describe the subject.

Object complements

Object complements follow a direct object to rename it or state what it has become.

Nouns can be placed before other nouns to describe a particular type of person or thing. In this case, two nouns are placed side by side and the noun placed before another noun functions as an adjective in that it is added to further describe the other noun.

An appositive is a noun or noun phrase that renames or clarifies the noun preceding it. It serves the purpose of adding information about another noun. The two nouns are separated by a comma.

Countable nouns

Countable nouns are individual people, animals, places, things, or ideas which can be counted.

Uncountable nouns

Uncountable nouns are not individual objects, so they cannot be counted. Uncountable nouns can be paired with words expressing plural concepts (glass, flock, pair) or quantifiers (some, many, a lot of).

Possessive nouns are nouns that possess something--the noun is the possessor of a thing or quality. Typically, possessive nouns are formed by adding apostrophes and an “s” to the noun. For possessives of nouns that are plural or end in “s,” only an apostrophe is added.