English Basics

What are parts of speech?

Words are the smallest elements of a language. In English language, based on their use
and functions, word are mainly categorised to eight parts of speech. They are:

- Nouns : Radha, tree, grief ,goat

- Verbs : run, play, sleep, laugh
- Adjectives: black, beautiful, wise, young
- Adverbs :quickly, slowly, very, properly
- Pronouns : I, you, he, they
- Prepositions :under, on, above, in
- Conjunctions : and ,or, because, but
- Determiners: my, this, the, a

There is also another small classification called Interjections which are used to express
surprise or strong feelings. Hurrah, wow, oh, ah etc are examples of such words. They are
grammatically related to other parts of speech. Therefore this word category has not been
included in the eight categories of parts of speech mentioned before.

Major portion of the English vocabulary come under the four main classes, nouns, verbs,
adjectives, and adverbs. Therefore the words of these four categories are called
vocabulary words.

Pronouns, prepositions, conjunctions, and determiners belong to much smaller classes.

These words are sometimes called as grammatical words.

Nouns
A Noun is the word used to express the name of person, place, quality, feeling, idea, or
thing.

Examples: Mary, Washington ,bitterness, sadness, book

Depending upon the function, there are several types of nouns, as follows:

Common noun.
Proper noun.
Abstract noun
Concrete noun
Collective noun
Countable noun
Uncountable (mass) noun
Compound noun
Common noun.
A common noun is the name given to a class of person, thing, or places .Common means
shared by all.

Example:

Flower (It can refer to any flower)

Country (It can refer to any country)
City (It can refer to any city)
Girl (It can refer to any girl)
Boy (It can refer to any boy)
River (It can refer to any river)
Common nouns are capitalized only when they start a sentence.

Proper noun:
A Proper noun is a name which refers to a single person, place, or something to make it
specific.

Examples of proper noun:

John – (refers to only one particular person.)

London – (refers to only one City. There is no other city named London)
Mary – refers to one particular girl.
Nile – refers to one particular river
Proper nouns are always written with a capital letter at the beginning.

Abstract nouns:
Abstract nouns are things you cannot see or touch (e.g., bravery, joy) that is, they are
intangible.

Abstract nouns are usually the name of a quality, action or state.

Example:

Beauty
Hope
Hunger
Thirst
Heroism
Concrete noun:
Concrete noun refers to the things you can see or touch .

For example:

Book
Car
Cloud
Collective noun
Collective noun is the name of a collection of person, animals, or things taken together
and spoken as one whole.

Examples:

Crowd – A collection of people.

Team – A group of players.
Flock – A group of birds
Herd – A group of cattle
Shoal – A group of fishes.
Class – A group of students
Army – A collection of soldiers.
Pride – A group of lions.
Countable noun
As the name indicates, Countable nouns are the name of the nouns which can be counted
as one, two, three, and so on. These nouns can take the indefinite articles, a or an (if there
is only one person or thing) or they can be used in the plural form.

Examples of countable nouns:

Singular Plural
Book Three books
Umbrella Several umbrellas
Pencil 10 pencils
Boy Five boys
Girl Many girls
Uncountable (mass) noun
Name of anything that cannot be counted is called an uncountable or mass noun.

Examples:

Swimming
Oil
Air
Water
Sand
Sugar
Compound noun
Compound nouns are nouns made up of more than one word. The word thus formed has a
new meaning
Examples:

Football
Mother- in-law.
Car park
Bus stop
Root cause
Station master
Nominalization (How to make nouns):
Nominalization is the forming of nouns from other parts of speeches generally from verbs
or Adjectives, using suffixes.

NOMINALISATION FROM VERBS:

a). Using the suffix,”-ing”: The easiest way to form a noun from verb is to use the
suffix,”-ing”.When a noun is thus formed, it is called a gerund.

Examples:

Swimming is a good exercise.

I like teaching.
b).Using the suffixes, “-or”, “-er”, “-r”, “ar”. A noun thus formed generally means one
who performs that action.

Examples:

Collector.(Someone who collects)

Worker.(Someone who works)
Baker. (Someone who bakes).
Preacher.(Someone who preaches)
Beggar. (Someone who begs)
c).Using the suffixes, “-ee”, “-ence”, “-ance”, “-ment”, “-tion”, “-sion”,”-al”, “-ure”.

Examples:

Devotee.(from the verb, devote)

Recurrence.( from the verb, recur)
Acceptance. ( from the verb, accept)
Amusement.( from the verb, amuse)
Statement.( from the verb, state)
Fluctuation.( from the verb, fluctuate)
Corrosion. ( from the verb, Corrode)
Approval. ( from the verb, approve)
Arrival. ( from the verb, arrive)
Pressure. ( from the verb, press)
Exposure. ( from the verb, expose)
NOMINALISATION FROM ADJECTIVES:
The suffixes,”-ness”,”-ence”,”-ance”, “-th”,”-y”, “-ity” are generally used to form nouns
from adjectives.

Examples:

Kind – kindness
Rich- richness
Useful- usefulness
Correct-correctness
Silent – silence
Important- importance
Wide-width
Difficult- difficulty
Able- ability
Touchable – Touchablity
Zero derivation
When a verb or adjective is used as it is as a noun, without changing its spelling, it is
called zero derivation or conversion. Conversion is common with verbs. When adjectives
are used as nouns without changing their spelling, they are known as nominal adjectives.
Then we use the article, the, before these words.

Examples:

The captain could take only two runs in the test- match.(run is noun here)
He runs very fast (run is verb here).
They insult me frequently.(Insult is verb)
I cannot tolerate their insults any more. (Insult is noun)
In our village, the poor help one another. (Here the poor is used as noun.)
Infinitive
Infinitives and infinitive phrases are also sometimes used as nouns.

Examples:

To walk in the morning is good for health.(Infinitive used as noun, that is as subject)
I like to read during Sundays.(‘to read’ is used here as a noun ,being the object of the
verb, like)
I had no choice, but to obey.( to obey, is object of preposition,” but”, hence here too the
infinitive is used as noun)
The Noun: Case
Case is the grammatical function of a noun or pronoun. In modern English there are only
three cases.
Subjective case.(Also called nominative case)
Objective case.(Also called accusative case)
Possessive case.(Also called genitive case)
SUBJECTIVE CASE (NOMINATIVE CASE)
When a noun or pronoun is used as a subject, it is called subjective case or nominative
case.

Example:

The man saw a snake.

In the above sentence, man is the subject. Therefore,”man” is a noun in the subjective
case.

Note: In order to know the Subject, put who? Or What? Before the verb and the answer is
the subject.

OBJECTIVE CASE. (ACCUSATIVE CASE)

I read a novel.

In the above sentence,” novel” is the object and it is the noun in the Objective case.

Note: In order to know the object, put whom? or What? before the verb and the answer is
the object.

POSSESSIVE CASE. (GENITIVE CASE)

Possessive case is mainly used for showing possession or ownership (but not always).
This case applies to nouns, pronouns and adjectives. With nouns, the possessive case is
shown by “of”, or adding “‘s “or just adding just “‘ ” to the end.

Examples:

Branches of the tree.

This is John’s book.

Book’s cover.

To make a singular noun possessive, we add ” ‘s “. To make plural noun Possessive we

add simply apostrophe.

Examples:

Baby’s shoes.
Babies’ shoes

Month’s end.

Bird’s eye.

Possessive pronouns: The possessive case pronouns are, mine, yours, his, hers, its, ours
and theirs.

Possessive adjectives: The Possessive adjectives are my, your, his, her, its, our, their and
whose.

The Noun: Gender

In English language, there are four types of genders of noun. They are:

Masculine gender
Feminine gender
Common gender
Neuter gender.
MASCULINE GENDER
A noun that denotes the male member of a species is called Masculine gender.

Examples:

boy
man
lion
peacock
cock
FEMININE GENDER
A noun that denotes the female member of a species is called feminine gender.

Examples:

Girl
Woman
Lioness
Peahen
Hen
COMMON GENDER
A noun that denotes the members of a species without specifying the gender is called
common gender.

Examples:
Student
Parent
Friend
Student
Person
NEUTER GENDER.
A noun that denotes things which have no gender is called Neuter gender.

Examples:

Pencil
Book
Tree
The Noun: Number.
There are two numbers in noun-Number. They are:

Singular Number
Plural Number
SINGULAR NUMBER
A noun that denotes one person or thing is said to be in singular number.

Examples:

Boy
Bird
Book
PLURAL NUMBER
A noun that denotes one person or thing is said to be in Plural number.

Examples:

Boys
Birds
Books
How plurals are formed:
Plurals are generally formed by adding” -s “to the singular.
Examples:

Boy- Boys

Girl-Girls
Plurals of nouns ending with -s, -ch,-sh,-o, or -x are generally formed by adding -es to the
singular.
Examples:

Glass-glasses

Bench-benches

Dish-dishes

Mango-mangoes

Tax-taxes

Plurals of nouns ending with ‘y’ are formed by changing ‘y’ into ‘i’ and adding ” -es” to
the singular.
Examples:

Baby-babies

Lady-ladies

Plurals of nouns ending with -f or -fe are formed by changing -f or -fe to ‘ v’ and adding
-es.
Examples:

Leaf- leaves

Wife- wives

Plurals of some of the nouns are formed by changing the inside vowel of the singular.
Examples:

Man-men

Foot-feet

Plurals of some of the nouns are formed by adding -en to the singular.
Ox- oxen

Child- children

Some nouns have same spelling in singular and plural.

Examples;
Sheep- sheep

Pair- pair

Dozen-dozen Some nouns are used only in plural.

Examples:

Scissors

Spectacles

Trousers

Some nouns which are seemingly plural are used as singular.

Examples:

Mathematics

Physics

News

Some collective nouns, seemingly singular, are always used in plural.

Examples:

Cattle

Poultry

A compound noun generally forms its plural by adding -s to the principal word.
Example:

Son-in-law sons- in- law

Passer- by passers- by

Many nouns taken from foreign languages, keep their original plural form.
Example:

Axis axes

Crisis crises
Note: For more details ,see: Noun-number

Verbs
A verb is a word (or combination of words) that is used to indicate an action in a
sentence.Verb is the most important word in a sentence. A sentence consists of a subject
which is a noun with or without adjunct and a predicate which essentially contains a
finite verb. The number of the verb must match with the number of the subject.(subject-
verb agreement).

Forms and categories of verbs

Depending on their function and form, there are different categories and forms of verbs.

1. Finite and non finite verbs

Finite verbs are verbs that have subjects and change form according to person and
number of the subject.Its form as per the tense too.(subject-verb agreement).

Examples:

They went to the market yesterday.

He is going to the market now.

I shall go to the market tomorrow.

Non – finite verbs: Non-finite verbs do not have tense and do not show agreement with
subject.They do not change their form.Gerunds(-Ing form of verb), infinitives, present
particples and past particples are non – finite nouns. Eg. swimming,to play,running,loved
etc.

Examples considering an infinitive,to buy::

They went to the market yesterday to buy vegetables.

He is going to the market now to buy provisions.

I shall go to the market next week to buy books.

In the above sentences, the non – finite verb, “to buy “,an infinitive , does not according
to tense.