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What Are Nouns

Nouns are words that name people, places, or things. There are two main types of nouns: proper nouns and common nouns. Proper nouns name specific people or things and are always capitalized, while common nouns name general categories and are not capitalized. Nouns can also be classified as countable or uncountable, collective or abstract. Countable nouns can be counted and have plural forms, while uncountable nouns cannot be counted. Collective nouns name groups, and abstract nouns name qualities or concepts.

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127 views2 pages

What Are Nouns

Nouns are words that name people, places, or things. There are two main types of nouns: proper nouns and common nouns. Proper nouns name specific people or things and are always capitalized, while common nouns name general categories and are not capitalized. Nouns can also be classified as countable or uncountable, collective or abstract. Countable nouns can be counted and have plural forms, while uncountable nouns cannot be counted. Collective nouns name groups, and abstract nouns name qualities or concepts.

Uploaded by

Chong Ru Yin
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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What are nouns?

A noun is a word used as the name of a person, place or thing. There are different kinds of
nouns. Read the following sentence:

Solomon was a wise king.


Here the noun Solomon refers to a particular king, but the noun king may refer to any other
king as well. Here Solomon is a proper noun and king is a common noun.

Similarly, Alice is a proper noun and girl is a common noun.


France is a proper noun and country is a common noun.

A proper noun is the name of a particular person or thing. A common noun is a name given in
common to every person or thing of the same class or kind.

Note that proper nouns always begin with a capital letter. Common nouns include what are
called collective nouns and abstract nouns.

Collective nouns

A collective noun is the name of a collection of persons or things taken together and spoken
of as one whole.

Examples are: jury, committe, class, family, team, folk, fleet, nation etc.

An abstract noun is the name of a quality, action or state which we can only think of.
Examples are: kindness, goodness, honesty, bravery, ignorance, stupidity, wisdom, laughter
etc.

Note that the names of arts and sciences are also considered abstract nouns.

Abstract nouns are formed from adjectives, verbs or common nouns. For example, the
abstract noun kindness is formed from the adjective kind whereas the abstract noun
obedience is formed from the verb obey.

© www.englishgrammar.org
What are nouns?

Countable and uncountable nouns

Nouns are also classified as countable and uncountable. Countable nouns are the names of
objects that we can count. Examples are: book, pen, apple, doctor, sister, boy etc.
Uncountable nouns are the names of things which we cannot count. Examples are: rice, gold,
wheat, honesty, beauty, oil etc.
Note that countable nouns have plural forms and can be used with the indefinite article a/an.
Uncountable nouns do not have plural forms and cannot be used with the indefinite articles.

© www.englishgrammar.org

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