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Language Structures — Part 3: Building Blocks / 2  |  |  Nouns designate something of substance - as opposed to features. When not isolated, they are the focus of a word bundle (hereafter referred to as noun bundle) comprising also articles, adjectives, determiners.
Nouns are found in subjects, objects(1), and most complements. The QUALIFIER (in the TO BE + QUALIFIER pattern) may be a "article + noun" bundle - Kubrik was a director, an adjective - Kubrik was clever, a "article + noun + adjective" bundle: Kubrik was a clever director). 3.2a — Concrete versus abstract nouns Nouns are concrete when they point to physically perceivable(2) entities: material elements (rock, ocean, sun, fire, water …), animals (snake, ant, cat, amoeba …), people (kid, youth, woman, cook …), their sub-parts or traits (branch, root, hair, sweat, top, suntan, freckles, wound, bleeding …), natural phenomena (wind, rain, shadow, frost, heat …). Nouns which do not qualify as concrete are abstract (see #3.2c below). A number of nouns are also recognised by animals.
3.2b — Common versus Proper Nouns Concrete nouns are either common or proper. Common nouns refer to general classifications. In addition, individual elements within one classification may be given proper nouns (or names). One particular specimen of the MAN class may carry the name of Robert. Other members of that class may carry that name too, but it can't be that all men carry the same proper name, because its purpose is to identify individual instances within a class. To at least some people (first and foremost to parents of the name-carrier), a proper name is primarily associated with one instance. When two members with the same name are found, for example in the same school, teachers and schoolmates differentiate their names a little (maybe into "Big Robert" and "Tiny Robert") to tell one from the other. Proper nouns must be capitalised when written. Common names must not be capitalised (except when a new clause begins with them, or to mark respect as in Mr. President, Mr. Judge or because only one specimen of that class is alive at the time being discussed — as for "Pope" in a text referring to the current one):
*For "Her Majesty", here capitalised out of respect, but not capitalised in a sentence like this: "When Patricia came in, her majesty made her look like a goddess". **Here we are giving a figure. But, with dates, thousands don't have the comma separator: May 15, 2002 (no comma in 2002 in most European languages - with Spanish being an exception). English grammar requires that nouns referring to national identities be capitalised. So we have:
His uncle only smokes Cuban cigars. Like most geographical terms, Cuban may be either a noun or an adjective, depending on context. In the clause: A Cuban won the Olympics for high-jumping we are dealing with a noun; in the clause: His uncle only smokes Cuban cigars. "Cuban" is an adjective (see #3.3b about adjectives), not a noun. 3.2c — Abstract Nouns Abstract nouns designate concepts drawn by reasoning from sets of circumstances or abstracted from a number of observations of a similar kind. Examples of abstract nouns are subtraction and multiplication, glee, size, personality, literature, worth and so forth.
3.2d — Gender Languages differentiate between two genders: masculine and feminine, with nouns being modified according to gender: heir/heiress, actor/actress, stallion/mare etc. To these two genders, some languages add a third: neuter. In essence, neuter indicates that the noun is neither masculine nor feminine. In English, most abstract nouns are genderless (neuter): the noun "life" takes up its as determiner (not her or his). 3.2e — Noun number Here, the distinction is between one item (singular) of the same kind and more than one (plural)(4). The general English rule is to add an "s" to the singular form to switch to plural. If the singular ends with letters that make it uneasy to add an "s", then "es" is added ("church" >> "churches"). In virtually all languages there is a list of nouns with irregular plurals ("child" >> "children"). The noun number is a notion relevant to concrete, common names. The plural form is rarely found with proper and abstract nouns(5). Collective nouns only are those which come in plural form only. In english, an example is "people"(6). Other nouns are only singular. Example: "news" ("The BBC news starts in five minutes"; to make it plural, add "item": "Three news items concern the company you work in"). For some nouns - like "sheep" - one same form exists for both singular and plural (A sheep was browsing / Sheep were browsing). Some English consisting of several constituting elements nouns are seen as singular or plural, depending on context and writing style: "staff", "police", "family", "crew".
noun police is seen as a unitary institution. But in the focus is on those policewomen or policemen doing the search.
with the Italian counterpart: There, an English mind perceives the subject (number) and its qualifier (of objections) as a packaged plural entity, because more than one objection is raised. Instead, Italian sets the predicate in singular form because the subject core (numero - a singular noun) is seen as distinct from its qualifying complement (di obiezioni). In the same vein, English may blend a predicate set in singular and a plural subject, as in the following BBC text on new forms of greeting:
The context of the article (click here to read a mirrored copy of it) shows that two kisses is short for greeting with two kisses, and predicate has become refers to the abstract notion of a particular manner of greeting rather than a countable number of kisses. But French, Spanish, German, Italian ... would feel bound by the formal plurality of the two kisses string to set the predicate in the third plural person (have become). Summing it all up:
FOOTNOTES
(1) — Objects are usually based on nouns — as in I write a letter.
But verbs may perform as objects as well: in the clause I want to sleep the object is to sleep (a verb).
(2) — In general, anything which we can experience with our physical means: sight, hearing, smelling, temperature-sensitive nerves … or also with instruments such as a telescope, an X-ray machine.
(3) — Viewing God as an abstract noun shows that the concrete/abstract alternative is not the same as the real/unreal dichotomy*. Many people believe that God exists and that it is the most real entity of all in spite of God not being perceivable though physical senses nor detected by scientific instruments. The general rule applies: this word is capitalised when intended to identify a particular individual, not any individual within a class:
When Patricia came in, her majesty made her look like a goddess. In Ancient Egypt, several gods were worshipped.
*Dichotomy: from two Greek roots meaning
(4) — Some languages — as Arabic and ancient Greek — have a form (called dual), to be applied when referring to two items. So, "dual" is a noun number in between "singular" and "plural".
(5) — However, family names may turn plural in sentences of the kind:
(6) — But when the word means "the population of a city, of a country" (as in The people of Canada is bilingual), it can be handled as a singular noun.
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