Nouns 1

Nouns satisfy most or all of these criteria:

• They can be singular or plural:
  one cigar; two cigars
• They can stand as the headword of a noun phrase:
  a cigar called Hamlet
• They can be modified by an adjective:
  a large cigar

The majority of nouns refer to people, places, things, and ideas.

Nouns can be divided into two groups: proper nouns and common nouns.

Proper nouns
Proper nouns are the names of individual people, places, organisations, works of art, and so forth. The important thing about proper nouns is that they refer to things that are one-off. You can only have one George Washington or Milton Keynes. Writers often mark this special nature by awarding initial capital letters. When official titles are used in this way they give them a capital letter:
The Hungarian Foreign Minister...
When they aren't, they dont:
...regular consultative meetings of foreign ministers...

Common nouns
All other nouns are common. Common nouns can be divided into countable and uncountable.

Nouns can act as the subject, object, subject complement, or object complement of a clause.

© John Seely 2008