NOUN

Welcome to this lecture headed “NOUN”. We will be discussing all about noun. Enjoy your lecture

A noun is earlier defined as the name of a person place or thing. It is a part of speech that is used to refer to a person, place, quality, action, thing or abstract idea. A noun can tell you who or what.

A noun can act as a subject, object, complement, appositive, or object of a preposition.

Nouns can be singular or plural. The plural form of a noun is usually formed by incorporating s at the end of the noun. But this is not at all times the case. There are exceptions to the rule. few plurals are irregular:

Singular	Plural
Fish	Fish
Tooth	Teeth
Man	Men
Woman	Women

Different types of nouns

There are various types of nouns:

1. An abstract noun names an idea, event, quality, or concept like freedom, love, courage…)

An abstract noun is a noun that you cannot perceive through sense, it is the name we give to an emotion, ideal or idea. They have no physical existence, you can’t see, hear, touch, smell or taste them. The opposite of an abstract noun is a concrete noun.

For example:-

Justice; an idea, bravery and happiness are all abstract nouns.

See a list of a few common abstract nouns below-

Adoration	Artistry
Belief	Bravery
Calm	Charity
Failure	Faith
Law	Liberty

Concrete Nouns

A concrete noun is the name of something or someone that we can experience through our senses, sight, hearing, smell, touch or taste. The majority of nouns are concrete nouns. The opposite of a concrete noun is an abstract noun.

 Concrete nouns name something identifiable through the sense like Cats, dogs, tables, chairs, buses, and teachers are all concrete nouns.

2. Animate nouns is used to refer to a person, animal, or other creature such as man, elephant, chicken etc. An inanimate noun is used to refer to a material object like stone, wood, table and so on.

3. A collective noun refers a group of things or people as a unit. E.g. – family, flock, audience and so on.

What is a collective noun?

A collective noun is a noun that can be singular in form whilst referring to a group of people or things. Collective nouns are every now and then confused with mass nouns.

Groups of people – army, audience, band, choir, class, committee, crew, family, gang, jury, orchestra, police, staff, team, trio

Groups of animals – colony, flock, herd, pack, pod, school, swarm

Groups of things – bunch, bundle, clump, pair, set, stack

The use of “of”

We frequently say a group of things, like a bunch of flowers, or a host of golden daffodils.

A few collective nouns can stand alone, such as “Britain has an army”, but if the collective noun “army” is used to mean something different from an organized military force, you can say things like “an army of women” or “an army of ants”, and also “an army of one”.

Plural or singular

When a group is considered as a single unit, the collective noun is used with a singular verb and singular pronoun.

For instance- The committee has reached its decision.

When the center of attention is on the individual parts of the group, British English from time to time uses a plural verb and plural pronouns.

For instance – “The committee have been in conflict all morning.” This is equivalent to saying “The people in the committee have been in conflict all morning.”

Nevertheless, if you are talking about more than one committee, you can then make use of the plural form.

For example – “The two committees have been in conflict over the years.”

A determiner in front of a singular collective noun is at all times singular: this committee, not these committee (although of course when the collective noun is in the plural form, it takes a plural determiner: these committees).

4. Common noun is a name of a group of comparable things like table, book, window, etc.

A proper noun, on the other hand, refers to the name of a one person, place or thing like John, Joseph, London etc.

5. Compound nouns refer to two or more nouns united to form a single noun like sister-in-law, schoolboy, fruit juice)

6.  Countable / Uncountable Nouns

Countable (or count) nouns  are nouns that have a singular and a plural form. In plural, these nouns can be used with a number- they can be counted for example friends, chairs, houses, boys…) Uncountable (or non count) nouns, on the other hand, can only be used in singular. They can’t be counted. Examples are money, bread, water, coffee and so on. A noun can be countable or uncountable. Countable nouns can be “counted”, they have a singular and plural form .

For example:

A book, two books, three books

An apple, two apples, three apples

Uncountable nouns as well known as mass nouns or non-count nouns) cannot be counted, they are not separate objects. This entails that you cannot make them plural by adding -s, due to the fact that they only have a singular form. It as well implies that they do not take a/an or a number in front of them.

For instance:

Water

Work

Information

Coffee

Sand

Some mass nouns refer to groups of specific things.

For instance:-

Tables, chairs, cupboards and so on are grouped under the mass noun known as furniture.

Plates, saucers, cups and bowls are classified under the mass noun crockery.

Knives, forks, spoons etc. are classified under the collective noun cutlery.

When you are on the go, suitcases, bags and so on are classified under the mass noun luggage / baggage. 

Turning uncountable nouns countable

You can turn the majority of uncountable nouns to countable nouns by placing a countable phrase/ word in front of the noun.

For instance:-

A piece of information.

2 glasses of water.

10 litres of coffee.

Three grains of sand.

A pane of glass.

It’s essential to differentiate between countable and uncountable nouns in English due to their usage is different in regards to both determiners and verbs.

More examples of countable Nouns

one dog	two dogs
one horse	two horses
one man	two men
one idea	two ideas
one shop	two shops

Sentence Examples

She has three goats.

I own a car.

I would like two chairs please.

How many clothes do you have?

More examples of UNCOUNTABLE NOUNS

tea

sugar

water

air

rice

knowledge

beauty

anger

fear

love

money

research

safety

evidence

Sentence Examples

There has been a lot of research into the causes of the terrorist attacks.

He gave me a great deal of advice before I resumed work.

Can you give me some information about living a married life?

He did not have much salt left.

Measure 1 cup of water, 300g of flour, and 1 teaspoon of sugar.

How much rice do you want?

complicated instance

A few nouns are countable in other languages but uncountable in English. They ought to follow the rules for uncountable nouns. The most common ones are: accommodation, advice, baggage, behavior, bread, furniture, information, luggage, news, progress, traffic, travel, trouble, weather, work

Sentence Examples

I would like to give her some advice.

How much bread do you want?

She didn’t make much progress today.

This appears like a lot of trouble to me.

We did an hour of work yesterday.

Be cautious with the noun hair which is normally uncountable in English, so it is not used in the plural. It can be countable only when referring to individual hairs.

Sentence Examples

My daughter has long blond hair.

The boy’s hair was curly.

Mum washed her hair yesterday.

My husband is getting a few grey hairs now. (refers to individual hairs)

I found a hair in my tea! (refers to a single strand of hair)

Compound Nouns

Words are joined to form compound nouns. These are very common, and new combinations are invented on a day to day basis. They usually have two parts. The first part illustrates to us what kind of object or person it is, or what its purpose is. The second part refers to the object or person in question. Compound nouns frequently have a meaning that is different, or more specific, than the two distinct words.

Primary part: type or purpose	Secondary part: what or who	Compound noun
Police	man	Policeman
Boy	friend	Boyfriend
Fish	tank	Water tank
Dining	table	dining-table

You have observed that the compound noun can be written either as a single word, as a word with a hyphen, or as two words. There are no clear rules about this. A recommended general rule is to write the most common compound nouns as one word, and the others as two words.

The elements in a compound noun are very different parts of speech.

Compound elements	For instance
noun + noun	bedroom water tank motorcycle printer cartridge
noun + verb	rainfall haircut train-spotting
noun + adverb	hanger-on passer-by
verb + noun	washing machine driving license swimming pool
verb + adverb	lookout take-off drawback
adverb + noun	onlooker bystander
adjective + verb	dry-cleaning public speaking
adjective + noun	greenhouse software redhead
adverb + verb	output overthrow upturn input

Regular Nouns

The majority of singular nouns form the plural by adding -s.

Examples

Singular	Plural
Boat	boats
House	houses
Cat	Cats
River	Rivers

A singular noun ending in s, x, z, ch, sh forms the plural by adding-es.

Examples

Singular	Plural
Bus	Buses
Wish	Wishes
Pitch	Pitches
Box	Boxes

A singular noun ending in a consonant and then y forms the plural by dropping the y and adding-ies.

Examples

Singular	Plural
Penny	Pennies
Spy	Spies
Baby	Babies
City	Cities

Irregular Nouns

There are a few irregular noun plurals. The most common ones are listed below.

For instance

Singular	Plural
Woman	Women
Man	Men
Child	Children
Tooth	Teeth
Foot	Feet
Person	People

A few nouns have the same form in the singular and the plural.

For instance

Singular	Plural
Sheep	Sheep
Fish	Fish
Deer	Deer
Species	Species
Aircraft	Aircraft

Asymmetrical Verb/Noun Agreement

A few nouns have a plural form but take a singular verb.

Plural nouns used with a singular verb	Sentence
news	The news is at 6.30 p.m
athletics	Athletics is good for young people
linguistics	Linguistics is the study of language
darts	Darts is a popular game in Europe
billiards	Billiards is played globally.

A few nouns have a fixed plural form and take a plural verb. They are not used in the singular, or they have a deferring meaning in the singular. Examples are: trousers, jeans, glasses, savings, thanks, steps, stairs, customs, congratulations, tropics, wages, spectacles, outskirts, goods, wits

Plural noun with plural verb	Sentence example
trousers	My trousers are too tight
jeans	Her jeans are black
glasses	Those glasses are his

Thanks for reaching to this point marking the end of this lecture.

Your Lecture Master:

Mst. Ugonwanne Joshua