Survey of English Grammar Wiki: Week 4

Nouns

1. Semantic test:
   • Nouns name persons, things or places
   • Problems:
     • Abstract nouns (often properties): honesty, happiness
     • Nouns denoting events or activities: party, rodeo, development
2. Morphological test:
   • Nouns can combine with a plural morpheme (-(e)s) to mark plurality
   • Problems:
     • not all nouns form plural in -s: children
     • not all nouns have singular/plural distinction:
       milk (no plural); scissors, cattle (no singular);
       sheep (identical form in sg. and pl.)
3. Syntactic test:
   • Nouns can occur with the possessive 's, i.e. in the environment: __ 's
   • Problem:
     • The possessive 's is a phrasal affix, i.e. it attaches to the right edge of a noun phrase,
       independent of the part of speech of the word at the right edge.
       We can construct examples where this word is NOT a noun:
       [a colleague of mine]'s car got stolen.
   • Nouns can occur between a determiner and a verb,
     i.e. in the environment:Det __ V
   • Problem:
     • not all nouns can combine with a determiner,
       in particular proper names cannot:
       (*The) Pat walked.

Subclasses of noun

Common nouns

1. Count nouns
   • Examples:chair, bottle, tool, clue
   • Characteristics:
     • plural form is possible
     • needs a determiner when used in the singular
     • combines with determiners such as a, every, many, few
     • does not combine with determiners such as much, little
2. Non-count (mass nouns)
   • Examples:furniture, equipment, evidence, music, advice, air, etc.
   • Characteristics:
     • no plural form is possible
     • does not need a determiner
     • combines with determiners such as some, much, little
     • does not combine with determiners such as a, every, many, few
3. Count and Non-count nouns
   • Examples:cake, beer
   • Characteristics:
     • a plural form is possible
     • does not need a determiner when used in the singular
     • combines with determiners such as some, much, little
       e.g. Would you like some cake?
     • combines with determiners such as a, every, many, few</>
       e.g. We need to buy a cake for her birthday.

Proper nouns

1. Examples: Chris, London
2. Characteristics:
   • no plural form is possible
   • does not allow a determiner at all

Pronouns

Pronouns	Examples	Characteristics
Personal	I/me, you/you, she/her, he/him, it, we/us, you/you, they/them	Can be used in all positions in which an NP can occur.
Possessive	1. my, your, her, his, its, our, your, their 2. mine, yours, his, hers, its, ours, yours, theirs	1. have the same distribution as the definite determiner. the 2. have the same distribution as an NP, but denotes an entity together with a possessive relation, i.e. mine refers to an entity that belongs to the speaker.
Reflexive	end in -self/selves: myself, yourself, herself, himself, itself, ourselves, yourselves, themselves	have the distribution of an NP. display person agreement with its antecedent. e.g. She likes herself., They like themselves.
Reciprocal	each other, one another	have the distribution of an NP and further distributional properties which are roughly the same as those for reflexive pronouns. do not display person agreement with its antecent. have genitive forms. e.g. each other's cars
Relative	who, which, whom, that, whose, when where	stand at the beginning of a relative clause, i.e. in the environment the N (P) __ NP V the man who Pat called, the book about which we spoke.
Interrogative	who, which, whom, where, when, whose, why, how	stand at the beginning of a wh-question, i.e. in the environment (P)__ Aux ...?

Noun Phrases

A noun phrase has a noun or a pronoun functioning as its head word, as it is exemplified in:
the linguist, the linguist over there, the omniscient linguist, or the bright, good-looking linguist. In all of these examples the head word is linguist. All have a pre-modifying determiner (the). Some noun phrases also have adjectives (omniscient, bright, good-looking), which function as pre-modifiers. Over there, in contrast, functions as a post-modifier.

The distribution of the noun phrase

An NP can occur:

• As the subject, i.e. at the beginning of a sentence before a verb as in: [NPThe student] is working hard.
• As the direct object, i.e. after a transitive verb as in: Chris met [NPthe student] yesterday.
• Following a preposition, as in: Pat talked about [NPthe student] again.
• In front of the possessive 's, i.e. in: [NPthe student] 's car broke.

Exercises on Nouns and NPs

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