Nouns, pronouns, and the simple noun phrase:

preview

Longman Student Grammar of Spoken and Written English

Biber; Conrad; Leech

(2009, p.55-101)

Grammar bite A The major types of nouns can be categorized in two

ways: countable v. uncountable nouns, and common v. proper nouns

Countable nouns have singular and plural number; uncountable nouns do not.

Common nouns refer to classes, while proper nouns refer to individuals.

Some nouns can switch between countable and uncountable (chicken(s), and some can switch between common and proper (two Cadillacs).

There are also special types of package nouns: collective nouns (crowd), unit nouns (loaf), quantifying nouns (ounce of gold) and species nouns (make of machine).

These special nouns are often followed by of

Grammar bite B The most common determiners are the definite and indefinite

articles (the and a/an) There is also a zero article, used with plural or uncountable nouns

for indefinite meaning All three articles can be used to express generic meaning (referring

to a class as a whole) Predeterminers precede determiners (all the) in a noun phrase;

postdeterminers follow determiners (the other) Possessive and demonstrative determiners are definite in meaning

(like the) whereas quantifying determiners are indefinite in meaning (like a/an)

Numerals (cardinal and ordinal numbers) are grammatically like a class of determiners.

Quantifying determiners and quantifying pronouns usually have the same form (e.g. all, few). We call both of them quantifiers.

Semi-determiners, such as (the) same and another, have characteristics of both determiners and adjectives.

Grammar bite C Number is the term for the contrast between

singular and plural in nouns In addition to regular plurals with –s, English has a

few classes of nouns with an irregular plural The genitive case in nouns is used to express

possession and other meanings Genitives can have the role of either a determiner

(whose?) or a modifier in the larger noun phrase (what kind of?)

Genitives can also be phrases, with their own determiners and modifiers (She’s going to a friend’s.)

Genitives overlap with of-phrases in the range of meaning they express

Grammar bite D English nouns do not have special inflectional endings for gender:

instead, gender is a semantic category in English English speakers often show gender bias in the way they use

masculine and feminine words, e.g. nouns ending in –man or –woman

Another example of gender bias is that the pronoun “he” has traditionally been used to refer to both men and women

Several strategies are used to avoid gender bias with nouns and pronouns

Derived nouns can be formed through affixation (prefixes [subgroup] and suffixes [baggage]), conversion [the whites] and compounding [swimsuit]

Forming new nouns with suffixes is especially common in academic writing, while compounding is especially common in news

Grammar bite E

The major types of pronouns are personal, reflexive, demonstrative, and indefinite

Personal pronouns refer to people and entities in the context of discourse; they can also have generic reference

Reflexive pronouns are used to refer back to the subject, or for emphasis

Demonstrative pronouns point to entities which are ‘near’ or ‘distant’ in the context of discourse

Indefinite pronouns are mostly quantifying words, related in form and meaning to quantifying determiners

Nouns, pronouns, and the simple noun phrase

Longman Student Grammar of Spoken and Written English

Biber; Conrad; Leech

(2009, p.55-101)

Types of nouns Countable and uncountable nouns

Countability is partly a matter of how we view the world, rather than how the world really is (e.g. furniture)

The same as countable or uncountable (tea – teas) Plural uncountable nouns (clothes)

Common and Proper nouns Proper nouns can sometimes have modifiers and possessive

determiners like common nouns. Initial capitals (Sam, Canada, Chevrolet, August, God...) Proper nouns regularly occurring with ‘the’ (the Nile, the Titanic) Proper nouns behaving like common nouns (keep up with the

Joneses – “Oh Lord, won’t you buy me a Mercedes Benz”) Concrete v. abstract nouns (distinction is semantic)

Concrete ones refer to physical entities or substances. Abstract ones refer to abstractions such as events, states, times, qualities.

The lab crew at Ciba-Geigy, the Swiss chemical and drugs giant, continues to seek out niche markets with a vengeance.

Package nouns

Collective nouns Bunch of roses; Crowd of fans; Flock of birds

Unit nouns (grain of salt) cut up a generalized substance into individual units

Quantifying nouns Nouns for a type of container (basket of eggs) Nouns for shape (pile of bricks) Measure nouns (pint of beer) Plural numeral nouns (hundreds of time) Nouns for large quantities (a load of garbage) Nouns ending in –ful (handful of people) Pair and couple (pair of gloves; couple of babies)

Species nouns (sort of character, make of machine) Refer to the type rather than the quantity of something

Types of determiners

Determiner type Countable singular nouns

Countable plural nouns

Uncountable nouns

Zero article ___ Books Milk

Indefinite article A book ___ ___

Definite article The book The books The milk

Possessive My book My books My milk

Demonstrative That book Those books That milk

Quantifier Every book Many books Much milk

Numeral One book Two books ___

Sometimes more than one determiner occurs in the same noun phrase (all the books) and in this case they occur in a fixed order (central, predeterminers and postdeterminers)

Indefinite meanings expressed by a/an Specific use of a/an (A 12-year-old boy got mad...) Unspecific use of a/an (I’m looking for a millionaire...) Classifying or generic use of a/an (He is a doctor / A doctor is not better

than...) Indefinite meaning with the zero article

Meals as institutions (go for dinner) and Places as institutions (go to jail) Predicatives with unique references (re-elected OPEC president) Means of transport and communication (travel by air; send by mail) Times of day, days, months, and seasons (when winter comes...) Parallel structures (from country to country) Block language (abbreviated) and Vocatives (No hard feelings, Doctor)

The definite article the (Indirect) Anaphoric use of the (an associated noun is used with the) Use of the with synonyms (indirect anaphora refers to same thing/person) Cataphoric use of the (reference is established by sth later in the text) Situational use of the (an entity is known from the situation)

Generic reference

The articles

Other determiners Possessive determiners

My, your, his, her, their... Make the noun phrase definite Demonstrative determiners

Situational reference, Time reference, Anaphoric reference, Cataphoric reference, Introductory this/that We went to this mall and there was this French restaurant.

Quantifiers (quantifying determiners) Inclusive (all), Large quantity (much), Moderate or small quantity

(few), An arbitrary or negative individual or amount (any) Numerals as determiners

Cardinal (similar to quantifiers); ordinal numbers (semi-determiners) Semi-determiners (same, other, another, last, such)

These forms lack the descriptive meaning that characterizes most adjectives, and like most determiners, they can also double as pronouns. (He’s living with her and another girl.)

Wh-determiner (to introduce interrogative and relative clauses)

Number and case in nouns Number: singular and plural

The singular form of nouns is the unmarked and most common form. Plurals are often formed by inflectional change.

Regular and irregular plurals Regular plurals (pronunciation /iz/ and spelling “calves/beliefs”) Irregular plurals (native [geese], latin and greek [alumni], zero [deer],

plural-only nouns [cattle] and singular nouns in –s [mumps]) Genitives as determiner [whose] and as modifier [what kind of] Independent genitives, group genitives, and double

genitives Genitives and of-phrases

The semantic class of the noun; The meaning relation between the two nouns; Collocations; Length of phrases: end-weight; Information flow: end-focus; Register distribution of genitives and of-phrases

Gender and noun formation Masculine, feminine, personal, and neuter

Masculine and feminine noun reference [bull – cow] Gender bias in nouns [spokesman – spokesperson] Gender bias in pronouns [Each novelist aims... the material he has...] Personal v.neuter reference with pronouns [babies – animals]

BORDERLINE

The formation of derived nouns Affixation (noun prefixes and suffixes)

Conversion No affix is added to the base, but the base itself is converted into a

different word class, usually adjective or verb into a noun they speak like the whites do in the South ... accused him of being a cheat

Noun compounds Bar code (noun+noun), Gunfire (noun+verb/noun), Housekeeping (noun+

verb ing), Dishwasher (noun+verb er), Cookbook (verb/noun+noun), Self-esteem (self+noun), Filing cabinet (verb ing+noun), Highway (adjective+ noun), Checkout (verb+particle), Overcoat (particle+verb/noun)

Compound nouns

SEPARATED

Credit card

Train station

TOGETHER

Shoelaces

Sunglasses

HYPHENATEDMother-in-law

AMBIGUITYPaper-clipChanging-room

Types of pronouns Personal pronouns (number, person, case, gender)

Case [nomin., accusat., posses.] and person forms of pronouns Person and pronoun usage (1st, 2nd, 3rd persons) Generic use of personal pronouns [You’ve got to be careful...] Case: nominative v. accusative personal pronouns

Possessive, reflexive, and reciprocal pronouns Demonstrative pronouns

Demonstratives are used to refer to humans in introductions. Indefinite pronouns

Compound pronouns (everybody, something, no one) Quantifying pronouns (I’ll eat some of the steak) The pronoun one

Substitute one, ones (An artist cannot fail, it is success to be one) Generic one, one’s, oneself (... a way of validating one’s existence)

Other pronouns (another, the other, others...)