Definition: Traditionally defined as the part of speech (or word class) that names or identifies a
person, place, thing, quality, or activity. Adjective: nominal.
Most nouns have both a singular and plural form, can be preceded by an article and/or one or
more adjectives, and can serve as the head of a noun phrase.
A noun or noun phrase can function as a subject, direct object, indirect object, complement,
appositive, or object of a preposition. In addition, nouns sometimes modify other nouns to form
compound nouns.
Types of Noun Forms and Functions:
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Abstract Noun and Concrete Noun
Animate Noun and Inanimate Noun
Attributive Noun
Collective Noun
Common Noun and Proper Noun
Compound Noun
Count Noun and Mass Noun
Denominal Noun
Deverbal and Verbal Noun
Plurale Tantum
ABSTRACT NOUN: Definition: A noun (such as courage or freedom) that names an idea, event,
quality, or concept. Contrast with concrete noun.
CONCRETE NOUNS: THEY refer to things we can touch, see, hear, smell, and taste, such as
sandpaper, soda, birch trees, smog, cow, sailboat, rocking chair, and pancake.
ACTIVITY: IDENTIFY THE CONCRETE NOUNS ON THE READING. John Updike's Concrete Nouns
"I kept looking out of the windows. The three red lights of the chimneys of the plant that had
been built some miles away, to mine low-grade iron ore, seemed to be advancing over our
neighbor’s ridged field toward our farm. My mother had mistaken me for a stoic like my father and
had not put enough blankets on the bed. I found an old overcoat of his and arranged it over me;
its collar scratched my chin. I tipped into sleep and awoke. The morning was sharply sunny; sheep
hustled, heads toppling, through the gauzy blue sky. It was authentic spring in Pennsylvania. Some
of the grass in the lawn had already grown shiny and lank. A yellow crocus had popped up beside
the BEWARE OF THE DOG sign my father had had an art student at the high school make for him."
ANIMATE NOUN AND INANIMATE NOUN:
A semantic category of noun, referring to a person, animal, or other creature.
A semantic category of noun that refers to a place, thing, or idea--not a person, animal, or other
creature.
ATTRIBUTIVE NOUN: A noun that modifies another noun and functions as an adjective. Also
known as a noun adjunct.
Examples are telephone company, cellular phone, bus stop, marriage certificate, book store, and
materials laboratory. Examples are telephone company, cellular phone, bus stop, marriage
certificate, book store, and materials laboratory.
COLLECTIVE NOUN. A noun (such as team, committee, or family) that refers to a group of
individuals.
COMMON NOUN AND PROPER NOUN
A noun that's not the name of any particular person, place, or thing. A common noun represents
one or all of the members of a class, and it can be preceded by the definite article (the). Contrast
with proper noun.
PROPER NOUN: A noun belonging to the class of words used as names for unique individuals,
events, or places. THEY are words and phrases used as names for particular individuals, places, and
events. Most proper nouns are singular, and most begin with a capital letter. This exercise will give
you practice in identifying proper nouns.
COMPOUND NOUN: Two or more nouns combined to form a single noun. Compound nouns are
written as separate words (grapefruit juice), as words linked by a hyphen (sister-in-law), or as one
word (schoolteacher).
COUNT NOUN
A noun that refers to an object or idea that can form a plural or occur in a noun phrase with an
indefinite article or with numerals. Contrast with mass noun (or noncount noun).
NON COUNT NOUN OR MASS NOUN: A noun (such as advice, bread, knowledge, luck, spaghetti,
and work) that names things that in English cannot usually be counted.
Denominal Noun: A noun that is formed from another noun, usually by adding a suffix--such as
villager (from village), New Yorker (from New York), booklet (from book), limeade (from lime),
lectureship (from lecture), and librarian (from library).
DEVERBAL NOUN: A word (usually a noun or an adjective) that is derived from a verb. Also called
derivative noun and derivative adjective.
VERBAL NOUN: A noun that is derived from a verb (usually by adding the suffix -ing) and that
exhibits the ordinary properties of a noun.
PLURALE TANTUM: A noun that appears only in the plural and does not have a singular form.
Plural, pluralia tantum. (A noun that appears only in the singular form--such as dirt--is known as
singulare tantum.) Scissors: an example of plurale tantum.
Outergarments: pants (orig. pantaloons), trousers, slacks, breeches/britches, bloomers, jeans,
dungarees, bell bottoms, chinos, tights, shorts, trunks, Bermudas.