4. Nouns

The purpose of this module is to introduce the basics of nouns. Each section is linked to an interactive activity and a corpus analysis activity, and the module concludes with comprehensive activities as well as key points and key concepts for review purposes. All interactive activities are in 4GA. Nouns Grammar Activities and all corpus activities are in 4CA. Nouns Corpus Activities.

4.1 What is a noun?

A noun is a person, place, concept, or thing that tells or names ‘who’ or ‘what’. Nouns are the most numerous part of speech, and are an open class, which means we can invent new ones.

In use, nouns are always a part of a noun phrase. A noun phrase can be a single noun or pronoun.

The pronoun test. To test whether a word is a noun/noun phrase, you can usually replace it with a pronoun/noun phrase like ‘it’, ‘they’, or ‘that’.

• Phoenix is the capital of Arizona. ⇒ It is the capital of Arizona. (therefore, ‘Phoenix’ is a noun/noun phrase)
• Phoenix is the capital of it.  (therefore, ‘Arizona’ is a noun/noun phrase)
• All you need is love. ⇒ All you need is this. (therefore, ‘love’ in this sentence is a noun/noun phrase)
• I love chocolate cake. ⇒ I it chocolate cake. (therefore, ‘love’ in this sentence is not a noun/noun phrase)
• The dogs love to play frisbee. -> They love to play frisbee. (‘The dogs’ is a noun phrase)
• The blue house at the end of the street is our house. → That is our house. (‘The blue house at the end of the street’ is a noun phrase)
• The money you gave me doesn’t cover the entire bill. → This doesn’t cover it. (both ‘the money you gave me’ and ‘the entire bill’ are noun phrases)

⇒ Go to Activity 4.1

⇒ Go to Corpus Analysis Activity 4.1

4.1.1 Noun morphology

Nouns are typified by certain suffixes, and can be derived from other parts of speech using them. Some common ones include –an, -ee, -ent, -er, -ism, -ist, -ment, -ness, -ship, -tion, and -ity. For example, the verb ‘speak‘ can be used to make a noun meaning ‘a person who speaks’ using the ‘-er‘ suffix in ‘speaker‘, or the verb ‘assume‘ can be made into a noun meaning ‘an act of assuming’ using the ‘-tion‘ suffix with ‘assumption‘.

⇒ Go to Activity 4.1.1

⇒ Go to Corpus Analysis Activity 4.1.1

4.1.2 Gerunds

Gerunds, which are VERB – ing forms, are nouns, for example:

• Speaking all day long wears me out.
• My hobby is salsa dancing.
• Running a marathon takes a lot out of you.
• Day drinking is a bad habit. 

VERB – ing forms can also be participles, used in the present progressive tense and as participial phrases, for example:

• She is speaking right now.
• They were dancing.
• Running around like crazy, the dog was out of control. 
• They stayed up drinking the night away.

Participles are verbs, not nouns. The pronoun test works to distinguish the two:

• Speaking all day long wears me out. ⇒ It wears me out. (‘Speaking all day long‘ is a noun phrase)
• They stayed up drinking the night away. ⇒ They stayed up it. 

⇒ Go to Activity 4.1.2

⇒ Go to Corpus Analysis Activity 4.1.2

4.1.3 Compound nouns

A compound noun is a noun composed of two or more nouns. They can usually be switched around and connected with the preposition ‘of’, ‘in’, or ‘at’, or with a relative noun clause (x that/who is the x).

• Baseball player (player of baseball)
• Kitchen drawer (drawer in a kitchen)
• University student (student at a university)
• Capitol building (building that is the capitol)
• Arizona capitol building (capitol building of Arizona)

⇒ Go to Activity 4.1.3

⇒ Go to Corpus Analysis Activity 4.1.3

⇒ Go to Corpus Activity 4.1.4: Insights into Nouns

4.2 Noun categories

Nouns can be categorized according to their referential meaning and their grammatical form.

• concrete or abstract  (house vs. home; kiss vs. love)
• general or specific (a desert vs. this desert; a mother vs. my mother)
• proper or common (Tucson vs. . the desert)
• singular or plural (student vs. students)
• non-count (mass) or count (music vs. song)

4.2.1 Concrete, abstract, general, or specific uses

Concrete nouns are physically tangible things (e.g. house, kiss), while abstract nouns are not (e.g. home, love). A concrete noun may also be used metaphorically, in which case it is functioning in an abstract sense.

• The book is on the table. (concrete).
• Love will keep us together. (abstract)
• Give your grandmother a kiss. (concrete).
• It was just a kiss of flavor. (abstract)

When used generally, a noun refers to any instance of that noun, and is indefinite. When used specifically, a noun refers to a specific instance of that noun, and is definite.

• People want to have a say in their government. (general use)
• The people who founded the city were refugees. (specific use)

⇒ Go to Activity 4.2.1

⇒ Go to Corpus Analysis Activity 4.2.1

4.2.2 Proper nouns

All nouns are common, unless they are names of unique entities, in which case they are proper. Proper nouns can be:

• people or heritages (e.g. Tim, Frodo, French)
• geographical places (e.g. Gila River, Arizona)
• commercial names (e.g. Target, Levi’s)
• institutions (e.g. University of Arizona, FBI)

Proper nouns are traditionally capitalized in Standard American English. Besides proper nouns, the first word of a sentence, acronyms, and the first person pronoun ‘I’ are capitalized.

Proper nouns are definite without use of determiners, that is, they don’t have to take a ‘the’ or ‘a’ if they are singular and count, e.g. We visited Arizona. We visited the Arizona.

Some nouns are considered proper even though they are not unique, e.g. months, days, and holidays (e.g. February, Wednesday, Groundhog Day)

⇒ Go to Activity 4.2.2

⇒ Go to Corpus Analysis Activity 4.2.2

4.2.3 Singular, plural, and collective nouns

Nouns can be singular or plural, which regular nouns mark with -s (or –es if the noun ends with a sibilant sound, e.g. boxes or dishes). Irregular nouns have unique plural forms, e.g. children, men, sheep, alumni
008000When acting as a subject, a noun (i.e. the head of a noun phrase) must agree in number with its predicate (e.g. The book is interesting. The books are interesting.) This is called subject-verb agreement.

Some nouns are only singular (e.g. Research is challenging. Dishware is breakable.), and can be singularized further using quantifiers (e.g. This bit of research is interesting. How many pieces of dishware fit into this box?)

Some nouns are only plural (e.g. My clothes are dirty. The scissors are missing.) even if they aren’t semantically multiple. They can be singularized using quantifiers (e.g. This bag of clothes is heavy. This pair of scissors is sharp).

Collective nouns are nouns used to refer to groups in the singular (e.g. The team is here. The committee has decided. The jury is out.) Collective nouns that quantify groups of animals and features of the physical world are unique to the animal or feature, (e.g. a flock of seagulls, a range of mountains)

⇒ Go to Activity 4.2.3

⇒ Go to Corpus Analysis Activity 4.2.3

4.2.4 Count and non-count nouns

Nouns can be used in count and non-count senses. Some nouns can be used in either sense, with a change in meaning. (e.g. ‘I don’t have time. I tried to call you several times’.)

Count uses are singular or plural, and may be modified by the determiners ‘many’ and ‘few’, but not ‘much’ or ‘little’. (e.g. How many kids came to the party? There were few dogs at the park.)

Non-count uses are only singular, and may be modified by the determiner ‘much’ and ‘little’, but not ‘many’ or ‘few’ (e.g. Don’t add too much salt. Can I get a little help here?).

Mass nouns are substances like food, liquids, gasses, and abstract concepts that are usually non-count and are countable using quantifiers (e.g. I need a cup of coffee). When used in the count sense, they refer to a single serving or item. (e.g. How many beers did you drink? He had three loves in life.)

⇒ Go to Activity 4.2.4

⇒ Go to Corpus Analysis Activity 4.2.4

4.3 Noun phrases

A noun phrase is a noun, a pronoun, or a noun with modifiers working together.

• Katie
• Ms. Hobbs
• she
• a person
• the Governor of the state of Arizona

The pronoun test. An entire noun phrase can be replaced with a pronoun like ‘it’, ‘they’, or ‘them’. This can be used as a test to identify the boundaries of a phrase. For example:

• That building is the capitol of Arizona.
• It is the capitol of Arizona.
• That building is it. 

However, one noun phrase can contain multiple noun phrases. ‘The capitol of Arizona’ is a noun phrase that contains two noun phrases, ‘the capitol’ and ‘Arizona’.

A multi-word noun phrase has a head noun along with modifiers – words that alter or specify the meaning of a head word – like determiners and adjectives.

• that building with the copper dome (‘building’ is the head noun)
• the capitol of Arizona (‘capitol’ is the head noun)

When these modifiers come before the head noun, they are called pre-nominal, for example:

• the university (‘the’ is a pre-nominal modifier and ‘university’ is the head noun)
• my little cat(‘my’ and ‘little’ are pre-nominal modifiers and ‘cat’ is the head noun)
• the most sensational, inspirational television show (everything but ‘show’ is pre-nominal and ‘show’ is the head noun)

When modifiers come after the head noun, like prepositional phrases and relative clauses, they are post-nominal. These can contain noun phrases themselves, functioning as objects.

• that building with the copper dome (‘that’ is pre-nominal, ‘building’ is the head noun’, and ‘with the copper dome’ is post-nominal)
• an old lady who swallowed a fly (‘an old’ is pre-nominal, ‘lady’ is the head noun, and ‘who swallowed a fly’ is post-nominal. ‘a fly’ is an embedded noun phrase functioning as an object.)

A gerund phrase can act as a noun phrase; the gerund is the head noun, sometimes with post-nominal modifiers.

• I don’t enjoy shopping at the mall on Sundays.
• Watching TV is my preferred Sunday activity.

NPs, whether one or multiple words, can function as subjects and objects.

• Books are relatively cheap. I read books every summer.
• The university is open today. They’re closing the university tomorrow.
• My little cat rules the house. I love my little cat. 
• Watching TV relaxes me. I enjoy watching TV. 

NPs can also be subject complements.

• The capitol is the building with the copper dome. 
• There was an old lady who swallowed a fly.

Noun phrases can be prepositional complements, and prepositional phrases can themselves be noun phrase modifiers. This allows for multiple embedded NPs, for example, in:

• a battle over the future design of the State Capitol

there are three NPs: the State Capitol, the future design of the State Capitol, and a battle over the future design of the State Capitol

⇒ Go to Activity 4.3.1

4.4 Nouns in language power techniques

Nouns are the most common part of speech and perhaps the most fundamental. One way to grasp the basic nature of nouns is to think about how they are used in doublespeak, the renaming of a concept that obscures its original negative meaning, allows for ambiguous interpretation, and may shift responsibility as to its cause. Usually this involves repurposing a synonym or a euphemism, which is an agreeable or inoffensive expression substituted for one that may offend or suggest something unpleasant. While euphemisms can use any part of speech, they are often nouns, compound nouns, and noun phrases, since we can invent new nouns, resurrect old ones, and build noun phrases with adjectives.

• correctional facility = prison
• golden years = old age
• gratuity = tip
• compensation = salary
• supervisor = boss
• homemaker = housewife
• landfill = garbage dump

Doublespeak is more purposefully deceptive than conventional euphemisms, however, and it is often used in politics or advertising to convince audiences that something is less disturbing or harmful than it actually is. For example:

• collateral damage = civilian deaths
• alternative truths = lies
• caramel color = brown dye
• genuine imitation leather = vinyl
• rightsizing = mass layoff

Doublespeak is especially deceptive when it is novel, that is, when it is invented and said to an audience that has never heard it before. Because it softens the meaning of something undesirable, making it more palatable, its use can lead to an audience accepting the thing uncritically.

Module author: Jonathon Reinhardt

Last updated: 26 October 2022

This module is part of Critical Language Awareness: Language Power Techniques and English Grammar, an open educational resource offered by the Clarify Initiative, a privately funded project with the goal of raising critical language awareness and media literacy among students of language and throughout society.