1st part: Introduction.

2nd part: Count,noncount and proper nouns.

3rd part: nouns with dual class membership.

4th part: reclassification of noun classes.

5th part:partitive constructions.

6th part: Determiners and the expression of quantity.

7th part: conclusion

8th part: bibliography

1.Introduction.

The expression of quantity in a language is inherent to nouns,since they are the lexical
items denoting the entities of the world.The expression of quantity, however, has also to be
specified by the elements preceding the noun, which will be independent upon the
particular features of the noun itself.

2.Count,noncount,and proper nouns.

Count nouns denote individual entities and not undifferenciated mass.You can count
them.Noncount nouns denote undifferenciated mass or continuum.

Furniture,grass,music….(mass or noncount nouns)

Book,bottle,chair,…….( count nouns)

Proper nouns are “common nouns”.

3.Nouns with dual class membership.

The division of nouns according to countabilility into count nouns and noncount nounsis
basic in English.Yet the language makes it possible to look upon some objects from the
point of view of both count and noncount, as in the case of “cake”:

Would you like a cake?

No. I don´t like cake.

Such nouns are said to have dual class membership.In other cases, e.g. “paper”, there is no
readily perceptible parallelism but a notable difference in meaning between the two nouns:
I want an evening paper ( newspaper)

Wrap the parcel up in brown paper ( wrapping paper )

This variation may also be seen in the use of quantifiers (much/many) in some of the
following examples:

She was a beauty in her youth count

She had great beauty in her youth noncount

She´s had many difficulties count

She´s not had much difficulty noncount

He´s had several odd experiences count

He hasn´t had much experience noncount

The lambs were eating quietly count

There is lamb on the menu today noncount

In other cases, the type of distinction that we may find in the count noun “lamb” (the
animal) and the noncount “lamb” ( the meat from the animal ) is achieved by separate
lexical items:

They raise a great many calves, pigs and sheep.

We eat a great deal of veal,pork and mutton.

Other count/noncount pairs realised by different lexical items are the following:

A garment-clothing

A permit-permission

A job-a task work

A poem-poetry

Note also the contrast between the noncount noun “money” and the count nouns naming
different units of money:

We haven´t much money left.We have only got a few coins/dollar bills/pund notes.
4.Reclassification of noun classes.

Nouns may also be shifted from one class to another by means of conversion.Thus a
noncount noun like “cheese” can be reclassified as a count noun involving a semantic shift
so as to denote quality partition “kind, type, form of…”

What cheeses have you got today.

Well, we have Cheddar,Gorgonzola…..

Similarly, a noun like “coffee”, which is normally noncount can be reclassified as a count
noun to mean an “ appropriate unit of” or as a “kind/sort/brand of”

Do you want tea or coffee?

Can I have a coffee please? ( a cup of coffee)

Two coffees,please? ( two cups of coffee)

This is a nice coffee.

I like Brazilian coffees best.

5.Partitive constructions.

Both count and noncount nouns can enter partitive constructions,i.e., constructions denoting
a part of a whole.Such constructions express both quality partition ( eg. “a kind of paper)
and a quantitative partition (eg. “ a piece of paper”).

5.1.Partition in respect of quality.

Quality partition is expressed by a partitive count noun like “kind,sort,type,….” Followed

by an “of-phrase”, for example:

SINGULAR PARTITIVES

A new kind of computers

A delicious sort of bread

Another type of research

PLURAL PARTITIVES

New kinds of computers

Delicious sorts of bread

Quality partition of noncount nouns may be expressed either by a partitive construction or

by reclassification:

A nice kind of coffee--- a nice coffee

English types of cheese --- English cheeses

5.2.Partition in respect of quantity.

5.2.1.Noncount nouns.

Noncount nouns are seen,as we have said, as denoting an undifferentiated

mass.However,the expression of quantity and thus, countability, may be achieved by means
of certain general partitive nouns, in particular “piece,bit,item…”, followed by an “of-
phrase”.

SINGULAR PARTITIVES

A piece of cake

A bit of chalk

An item of news

PLURAL PARTITIVES

Two pieces of cake

Some bits of chalk

Several items of news

Quantity of noncount nouns may thus often be expressed either by partitive nouns or by
reclassification: two lumps of sugar, two sugars.

The most widely used partitive expression is “a piece of”, which can be combined with
both concrete and abstract nouns.

-concrete: a piece of bacon/chalk/coal/land/paper.

-abstract. A piece of advice/information/news/research/work.

“bit” generally implies a small quantity: a bit of rice/news/fun/research.

In addition to this,there are some descriptive typical partitives which form expressions with
specific concrete noncount nouns,such as the following:

An atom/ grain of truth a blade of grass

A bar of chocolate/soap/gold a block of ice

A cut of lamb/ meat a drop of water

A loaf of bread a speck of paper/metal

A sheet of paper/metal

5.2.2.Plural count nouns.

Whereas the general partitive “ a piece of” can be used with many of the noncount nouns, it
cannot be used with plural count nouns.Other partitives are used with them:

A crowd of people

A flock of birds/sheep

A herd of cattle

A packet of cigarettes

A series of lectures

A bunch of flowers/keys

5.2.3.Singular count nouns.

Partition can also be expressed in reference to singular count nouns,eg.

A piece of a loaf

A branch of a tree

A page of a book

A section of a newspaper

A verse of a poem

Fractional partition can also be expressed by such general quantitative items as “all,half,
whole + of + noun”, eg.
I´d like all of that piece of meat

I´d like the remainder of that piece of meat.

6.Determiners and the expression of quantity.

Determiners are elements which serve to link nouns to the linguistic or situational
context.We can distinguish between definite and indefinite reference:

Have you seen a bicycle? (indefinite )

Have you seen the bicycle? (definite)

We can distinguish three classes of determiners:

1. Predeterminers: half,alol,double
2. central determiners
3. postdeterminers

6.1.central determiners.

The most common and typical central determiners are definite and indefinite articles,
“the”,”a”,”an”.The two classes of common nouns (count nouns and noncount nouns )
combine with the number distribution ( singular and plural ), and also with the feature of
definiteness (definite and indefinite),in the following way,

The book ( singular definite count noun )

Furniture ( singular indefinite noncount noun )

Books ( plural indefinite count noun)

Other central determiners are for example “ this, that, every, no, each”.These elements are
also mutually exclusive.We cannot find two of them co-occurring before the head of the
noun phrase.

6.2.predeterminers.

They can occur before certain determiners, most of them indicate quantity.

6.2.1. all,both,half.

They have certain restrictions in the combinations with other determiners.They can occur
before the articles, possessive determiners,demonstrative determiners.However, since they
are themselves quantifiers, “all,both and half” do not occur with the quantitative
determiners “every,(n)either,some,each,no,any,enough”.
All (the) day half a day both (the/my) eyes

In addition to this,they as pronouns can take partitive of-phrases,which are optional with
nouns and obligatory with pronouns:

All (of) the students all of them/whom

Both(of) his eyes both of them

Half (of) the time/cost half of it/this

6.2.2. whole,multipliers (double,twice,…), fractions (one-third, two-fifths…).

“All” and “whole” are used with temporal nouns:

all (the) day/morning/week

the whole ………………..

“All” and “the whole” is used with other count nouns and other nouns without the definite
article:

all the family/way/story

the whole …………….

These elements are also used with proper nouns and other nouns without the definite
article:

All (of) Finland/London/ next month

The whole of………………………

The multipliers can appear as in:

Twice his strength

Double the amount

Three times his salary

“once”,”twice”,…..can co-occur with “a,every,each,per…” to form distributive

expressions:

once a day, twice every week three times each year,…

6.3. Postdeterminers.

6.3.1.Cardinal numbers.

“ONE” c0-occurs with singular count nouns ( one sister), and the other cardinal numerals
co-occur with plural count nouns ( two,three,brothers).

In many cases ,”one” may be regarded as a stressed form of the indefinite article and may
sometimes replace it.

I would like a/one photocopy of this article.

6.3.2.Ordinal numerals and general numerals.

The ordinal numerals have a one-for-one relation with the cardinals:

First/one second/two third/three

Ordinals co-occur with count nouns and usually precede any cardinal number in the noun
phrase:

The first two days ; another three weeks

6.3.3.Closed-class quantifiers.

There are two small groups of closed-class quantifiers which function as post-modifiers:

-Many,(a) few,several, co-occur only with plural count nouns:

there are too many mistakes in your essay

only a few

very few

several

-Much and (a) little co-occur only with noncount nouns:

she hasn´t got much money

she has only got (a) little money

“much” is mostly used in non-assertive sentence .However, in an assertive sentence usually

“a lot of” is used.
We have plenty of time

A lot of

Lots of

In the case of (a) few (small number) and “(a) little” (a small quantity), there is
positive/negative contrast according to whether the indefinite article is used or not.When a /
an does not precede, “few” and “little” are stressed.

He wrote a few books, (some, several )

He wrote few books (not many)

6.3.4.open-class quantifiers.

There is also a large open class of phrasal quantifiers which function semantically like the
closed-class quantifiers, but most of which consist of a noun of quantity ( lot,deal, amount )
followed by “of” and often preceded by the indefinite article.Some of these, including
·”plenty of”, co-occur equally with noncount and plural count nouns.

The room contained plenty of students.

A lot of

Lots of

7.Conclusion.

In this unit we have seen how the English language organizes the expression of quantity
both in nouns and determiners.

8.Bibliography.

Quirk,R.et al. (1985),”Acomprehensive grammar of the English language”.Longman