Nouns are divided into proper and common nouns according to their meaning. The very definitions of this part of speech have Old Slavonic roots.
The term "common" comes from "reprimand", "reproach", and is used for the general name of homogeneous, similar objects and phenomena, and "own" means "feature", an individual person or a single object. This naming distinguishes it from other objects of the same type.
For example, the common word "river" defines all rivers, but the Dnieper, Yenisei are proper names. These are constant grammatical features of nouns.
What are proper names in Russian
A proper name is an exclusive name for an object, phenomenon, person, different from others, standing out from other multiple concepts.
These are the names and nicknames of people, the names of countries, cities, rivers, seas, astronomical objects, historical events, holidays, books and magazines, animal names.
Also, ships, enterprises, various institutions, product brands and much more that require a special name can have their own names. May consist of one or more words.
Spelling is determined by the following rule: all proper names are capitalized. For example: Vanya, Morozko, Moscow, Volga, Kremlin, Russia, Russia, Christmas, Battle of Kulikovo.
Names that have a conditional or symbolic meaning are enclosed in quotation marks. These are the names of books and various publications, organizations, firms, events, etc.
Compare: Big theater, but the Sovremennik theater, the Don River and the Quiet Don novel, the play Thunderstorm, the Pravda newspaper, the Admiral Nakhimov motor ship, the Lokomotiv stadium, the Bolshevichka factory, the Mikhailovskoye Museum-Reserve.
Note: the same words, depending on the context, are common or proper and are written according to the rules. Compare: bright sun and star Sun, native earth and planet Earth.
Proper names, consisting of several words and denoting a single concept, are underlined as one member of the sentence.
Let's look at an example: Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov wrote a poem that made him famous. So, in this sentence, the subject will be three words (first name, patronymic and last name).
Types and examples of proper nouns
Proper names are studied by the linguistic science of onomastics. This term is derived from the ancient Greek word and means "the art of giving names"
This area of linguistics deals with the study of information about the name of a specific, individual object and identifies several types of names.
Anthroponyms are called proper names and surnames of historical figures, folklore or literary characters, famous and ordinary people, their nicknames or pseudonyms. For example: Abram Petrovich Hannibal, Ivan the Terrible, Lenin, Lefty, Judas, Koschey the Immortal.
Toponyms study the appearance of geographical names, names of cities, streets, which may reflect the specifics of the landscape, historical events, religious motifs, lexical features of the indigenous population, and economic signs. For example: Rostov-on-Don, Kulikovo field, Sergiev Posad, Magnitogorsk, Strait of Magellan, Yaroslavl, Black Sea, Volkhonka, Red Square, etc.
Astronyms and cosmonyms analyze the appearance of the names of celestial bodies, constellations, galaxies. Examples: Earth, Mars, Venus, Halley's Comet, Stozhary, Ursa Major, Milky Way.
There are other sections in onomastics that study the names of deities and mythological heroes, the names of nationalities, the names of animals, etc., helping to understand their origin.
Common noun - what is it
These nouns name any concept from a set of similar ones. They have a lexical meaning, that is, informativeness, in contrast to proper names, which do not have such a property and only name, but do not express the concept, do not reveal its properties.
The name doesn't tell us anything Sasha, it only identifies a particular person. In the phrase girl Sasha, we learn the age and gender.
Common noun examples
Common names are all the realities of the world around us. These are words expressing specific concepts: people, animals, natural phenomena, objects, etc.
Examples: doctor, student, dog, sparrow, thunderstorm, tree, bus, cactus.
Can denote abstract entities, qualities, states or characteristics:courage, understanding, fear, danger, peace, power.
How to define a proper or common noun
A common noun can be distinguished by meaning, because it names an object or phenomenon related to homogeneous, and a grammatical feature, because it can change by numbers ( year - years, man - people, cat - cats).
But many nouns (collective, abstract, real) do not have a plural form ( childhood, darkness, oil, inspiration) or the only one ( frosts, weekdays, darkness). Common nouns are written with a small letter.
Proper nouns are the distinctive name of single objects. They can only be used in the singular or plural ( Moscow, Cheryomushki, Baikal, Catherine II).
But if they call different persons or objects, they can be used in the plural ( Ivanov family, both Americas). Capitalized, enclosed in quotation marks if necessary.
It is worth noting: between proper and common names there is a constant exchange, they tend to move into the opposite category. common words Faith Hope Love became proper names in Russian.
Many borrowed names were also originally common nouns. For example, Peter - "stone" (Greek), Victor - "winner" (Lat.), Sophia - "wisdom" (Greek).
Often in history, proper names become common nouns: bully (English Houlihan family with a bad reputation), volt (physicist Alessandro Volta), colt (inventor Samuel Colt). Literary characters can acquire a common noun: donquixote, Judas, plushkin.
Toponyms have given names to many objects. For example: cashmere fabric (Kashmir Valley of Hindustan), cognac (province in France). At the same time, an animate proper name becomes an inanimate common noun.
And vice versa, it happens that generic concepts become uncommon: Lefty, cat Fluff, signor Tomato.
Quite often, students ask: "What is a common noun and a proper name?" Despite the simplicity of the question, not everyone knows the definition of these terms and the rules for writing such words. Let's figure it out. After all, in fact, everything is extremely simple and clear.
Common noun
The most significant layer of nouns are They denote the names of a class of objects or phenomena that have a number of features by which they can be attributed to the specified class. For example, common nouns are: cat, table, corner, river, girl. They do not name any particular object or person, animal, but designate a whole class. When we use these words, we mean any cat or dog, any table. Such nouns are written with a small letter.
In linguistics, common nouns are also called appellatives.
Proper name
Unlike common nouns, they make up an insignificant layer of nouns. These words or phrases denote a specific and specific object that exists in a single copy. Proper names include names of people, names of animals, names of cities, rivers, streets, countries. For example: Volga, Olga, Russia, Danube. They are always capitalized and refer to a specific person or single object.
The science of onomastics is engaged in the study of proper names.
Onomastics
So, what is a common noun and a proper name, we have sorted it out. Now let's talk about onomastics - a science that studies proper names. At the same time, not only names are considered, but also the history of their occurrence, how they have changed over time.
Onomast scientists distinguish several directions in this science. So, the study of the names of people is engaged in anthroponymy, the name of peoples - ethnonymy. Cosmonymics and astronomy study the names of stars and planets. Animal nicknames are explored by zoonymy. Theonymy deals with the names of the gods.
This is one of the most promising branches in linguistics. Until now, research on onomastics is being carried out, articles are being published, conferences are being held.
Transition of common nouns to proper names, and vice versa
A common noun and a proper name can move from one group to another. Quite often it happens that a common noun becomes a proper name.
For example, if a person is called by a name that was previously included in the class of common nouns, it becomes its own. A vivid example of such a transformation is the names Vera, Love, Hope. Previously, they were common nouns.
Surnames formed from common nouns also pass into the category of anthroponyms. So, you can highlight the names Kot, Cabbage and many others.
As for proper names, they quite often pass into another category. Often this refers to the names of people. Many inventions bear the names of their authors, sometimes the names of scientists are assigned to quantities or phenomena discovered by them. So, we know the units of ampere and newton.
The names of the heroes of the works can become common nouns. So, the names Don Quixote, Oblomov, Uncle Styopa became the designation of certain features of appearance or character characteristic of people. Names and surnames of historical figures and celebrities can also be used as common nouns, for example, Schumacher and Napoleon.
In such cases, it is necessary to clarify what exactly the addresser has in mind in order to avoid mistakes when writing the word. But often you can from the context. We think you understand what a common noun and a proper name are. The examples we have given show this quite clearly.
Rules for writing proper names
As you know, all parts of speech obey the rules of spelling. Nouns - common noun and proper - are also no exception. Remember a few simple rules that will help you avoid annoying mistakes in the future.
- Proper names are always capitalized, for example: Ivan, Gogol, Catherine the Great.
- Nicknames of people are also capitalized, but without quotation marks.
- Proper names used in the meaning of common nouns are written with a small letter: donquixote, donjuan.
- If service words or generic names (cape, city) stand next to a proper name, then they are written with a small letter: the Volga River, Lake Baikal, Gorky Street.
- If a proper name is the name of a newspaper, cafe, book, then it is taken in quotation marks. In this case, the first word is written with a capital letter, the rest, if they do not belong to proper names, are written with a small letter: "Master and Margarita", "Russian Truth".
- Common nouns are written with a small letter.
As you can see, the rules are pretty simple. Many of them are known to us since childhood.
Summing up
All nouns are divided into two large classes - proper nouns and common nouns. The first is much less than the second. Words can move from one class to another, while acquiring a new meaning. Proper names are always capitalized. Common nouns - with a small one.
§one. General characteristics of the noun
The noun is an independent significant part of speech.
1. grammatical meaning- "subject".
Nouns are words that answer the questions:
Who? , What?
2. Morphological features:
- constants - common noun / proper, animate / inanimate, gender, type of declension;
- changeable - number, case.
3. Syntactic role in a sentence any, especially often: subject and object.
The kids love the holidays.
As an appeal and introductory words, the noun is not a member of the sentence:
- Sergey!- my mother calls me from the yard.
(Sergey- address)
Unfortunately, it's time to go do your homework.
(Unfortunately- introductory word)
§2. Morphological features of nouns
Nouns have a set of morphological features. Some of them are permanent (or immutable). Others, on the contrary, are non-permanent (or changeable). Unchangeable signs refer to the whole word as a whole, and changeable to the forms of the word. So noun Natalia- animated, own, female, 1 cl. In whatever form it may be, these signs will be preserved. Noun Natalia may be in the form of and many others. numbers, in different cases. Number and case are inconstant signs of nouns. In the illustration, dotted lines lead to such non-permanent or variable morphological features. It is necessary to learn to distinguish which signs are permanent and which are non-permanent.
§3. Common nouns - proper nouns
This is the division of nouns according to the features of the meaning. Common nouns denote homogeneous objects, i.e. any object from their series, and proper nouns call a separate specific object.
Compare nouns:
- child, country, river, lake, fairy tale, turnip - common nouns
- Alexey, Russia, Volga, Baikal, "Repka" - own
Common nouns are varied. Their ranks by value:
- specific: table, computer, document, mouse, notebook, fishing rod
- abstract (abstract): surprise, joy, fear, happiness, miracle
- real: iron, gold, water, oxygen, milk, coffee
- collective: youth, foliage, nobility, spectator
Proper nouns include names of people, nicknames of animals, place names, names of works of literature and art, etc.: Alexander, Sasha, Sashenka, Zhuchka, Ob, Ural, "Teenager", "Gingerbread Man" etc.
§four. Animation - inanimateness
Animate nouns call "living" objects, and inanimate - not "living".
- Animated: mother, father, child, dog, ant, Kolobok (hero of a fairy tale, acting as a living person)
- Inanimate: orange, ocean, war, lilac, program, toy, delight, laughter
For morphology, it is important that
- in plural in animate nouns
Near the school, I saw familiar girls and boys (vin. pad. = born. pad.), and in inanimate nouns wine form. pad. matches the shape. pad.: I love books and films (vin. pad. = im. pad.) - in the singular for animate masculine nouns wine form. pad. matches the form. fall:
The fox saw Kolobok (wine fall = genus fall), and for inanimate nouns of masculine gender wine form. pad. matches the shape. pad.: I baked a gingerbread man (wine. pad. = im. pad.)
The rest of the nouns have the form im., vin. and genus. cases are different.
Means, sign of inanimateness can be determined not only based on the meaning, but also on the set of word endings.
§5. Genus
gender of nouns is a permanent morphological feature. Nouns do not change by gender.
There are three genders in Russian: male, female and average. The sets of endings for nouns of different genders differ.
In animate nouns, the reference to the masculine or feminine gender is motivated by gender, since the words denote male or female persons: father - mother, brother - sister, husband - wife, man - woman, boy - girl etc. The grammatical sign of gender correlates with gender.
For inanimate nouns, the belonging of the word to one of the three genders is not motivated. The words ocean, sea, river, lake, pond- different gender, and the gender is not determined by the meaning of the words.
The morphological indicator of the genus is the endings.
If the ending word has:
a, y or a, oh, e in the singular and s, ov, am, s or ow, ah, ah in plural , then it is a masculine noun
a, s, e, y, oh, e in the singular and s, am or s, ami, ah in the plural, it is a feminine noun
oh, a, u, oh, om, e in the singular and ah, ah, ah, ah, ah in the plural, it is a neuter noun.
Do all nouns belong to one of the three genders?
No. There is a small group of amazing nouns. They are interesting in that they can refer to both males and females. These are the words: smart girl, glutton, sleepyhead, greedy, crybaby, ignorant, ignorant, wicked, bully, slob, wicked, muddler, slobber, daredevil etc. The form of such words coincides with the form of feminine words: they have the same set of endings. But the syntactic compatibility is different.
In Russian you can say:
She is so smart! AND: He is so smart! The meaning of the gender of an animate person can be found out by the form of a pronoun (as in our example) or an adjective, or a verb in the past tense: Sonya woke up. AND: Sonya woke up. Such nouns are called common nouns.
Common nouns do not include words that name professions. You may already know that many of these are masculine nouns: doctor, driver, engineer, economist, geologist, philologist etc. But they can designate both male and female persons. My mother is a good doctor. My father is a good doctor. Even if the word names a female person, then adjectives and verbs in the past tense can be used in both masculine and feminine: The doctor came. AND: The doctor came.
How to determine the gender of immutable words?
There are invariable nouns in the language. All of them are borrowed from other languages. In Russian, they have a gender. How to determine the genus? It's easy if you understand what the word means. Let's look at examples:
Monsieur - madam- in words denoting an animated person, gender matches gender.
Kangaroo, chimpanzee- words for animals male.
Tbilisi, Sukhumi- words - city names - male.
Congo, Zimbabwe- words - names of states - neuter.
Mississippi, Yangtze- words - names of rivers - female.
Coat, muffler- words denoting inanimate objects are more often neuter.
Are there any exceptions? There is. Therefore, it is recommended to pay attention to unchangeable words and remember how they are used. The gender is expressed not by the ending (indeclinable words have no endings), but by the form of other words that are related to the unchangeable noun in meaning and grammatically. These can be adjectives, pronouns or verbs in the past tense. For example:
Mississippi wide and full.
Short adjectives in the form of f.r. indicate that the word Mississippi zh.r.
§6. declination
declination is a type of word change. Nouns change in number and case. Number and case are variable morphological features. Depending on what forms the word has in different numbers and cases, in the totality of all possible forms, nouns belong to one of the declensions.
Nouns have three declensions: 1st, 2nd and 3rd. The vast majority of Russian nouns are nouns of the 1st, 2nd or 3rd declension. The type of declension is a constant, unchanging morphological feature of nouns.
The 1st declension includes feminine and masculine words with endings a, I in its original form.
Examples: mom, dad, grandfather, water, earth, Anna, Anya, lecture - ending [a].
The 2nd declension includes masculine words with zero ending and neuter gender with endings about, e
in its original form.
Examples: father, brother, house, Alexander, sea, lake, building - ending [e] , genius, Alexey.
The 3rd declension includes null-ending feminine words in its original form.
Examples: mother, mouse, night, news, rye, lie.
initial form- this is the form of the word in which it is usually fixed in dictionaries. For nouns, it is the nominative singular form.
Pay attention to the words traditionally called nouns on ia, ie, uy : lecture, building, genius.
What is the correct ending for these words?
Do you remember that the letters I and e, which are written at the end of such feminine and neuter nouns after vowels, and the letter and - vowel represent two sounds? Lecture- [i'a], building- [i’e], and the sound [i’] is the last consonant of the base. So, in words like lecture ending [a], in words like building- [e], and in words like genius- null ending.
So the feminine nouns are: lecture, station, demonstration belong to the 1st declension, and masculine: genius and middle: building- to the 2nd.
Another group of words requires commentary. These are the so-called neuter nouns me , the words path and child. These are inflected nouns.
Inflected nouns- these are words that have endings characteristic of forms of different declensions.
There are few such words. All of them are very ancient. Some of them are common in today's speech.
List of nouns on me: stirrup, tribe, seed, burden, udder, crown, time, name, flame, banner.
For their spelling, see All spelling. Spelling of nouns
§7. Number
Number- this is a morphological feature that is changeable for some nouns and unchanged, constant for others.
The vast majority of Russian nouns change in number. For example: home - at home, girl - girls, elephant - elephants, night - nights. Nouns that change in number have both singular and plural forms and endings corresponding to these forms. For a number of nouns, the singular and plural forms differ not only in endings, but also in the stem. For example: man - people, child - children, kitten - kittens.
A smaller part of Russian nouns does not change in numbers, but has the form of only one number: either singular or plural.
Singular nouns:
- collective: nobility, children
- real: gold, milk, curdled milk
- abstract (or abstract): greed, anger, kindness
- some of their own, namely: geographical names: Russia, Suzdal, Petersburg
Plural nouns:
- collective: shoots
- real: cream, cabbage soup
- abstract (or abstract): chores, elections, twilight
- some own, namely geographical names: Carpathians, Himalayas
- some specific (objective), watches, sledges, as well as a group of nouns denoting objects that consist of two parts: skis, skates, glasses, gates
Remember:
Most things denoted by nouns that have only the form of a singular or plural person cannot be counted.
For such nouns, the number is an invariable morphological feature.
§eight. case
case- this is a non-permanent, changeable morphological feature of nouns. There are six cases in Russian:
- Nominative
- Genitive
- Dative
- Accusative
- Instrumental
- Prepositional
You need to firmly know the case questions, with the help of which it is determined in which case the noun is. Since, as you know, nouns are animate and inanimate, there are two questions for each case:
- I.p. - who what?
- R.p. - who?, what?
- D.p. - to whom; to what?
- V.p. - who?, what?
- etc. - who?, what?
- P.p. - (About who about what?
You see that for animate nouns the questions of win.p. and genus. etc., and for the inanimate - to them. p. and wine. P.
In order not to be mistaken and correctly determine the case, always use both questions.
For example: I see an old park, a shady alley and a girl and a young man walking along it.
I see (who?, what?) a park(vin. p.), alley(vin. p.), girl(vin. p.), human(vin. p.).
Do all nouns change by case?
No, not all. Nouns that are called invariable do not change.
Cockatoo (1) sits in a cage in a store. I approach the cockatoo (2) . This is a big beautiful parrot. I look at the cockatoo (3) with interest and think: - What do I know about the cockatoo (4)? I don't have a cockatoo (5) . With cockatoo (6) interesting.
Word cockatoo met in this context 6 times:
- (1) who?, what? - cockatoo- I.p.
- (2) I approach (to) whom ?, what? - (k) cockatoo- D.p.
- (3) look (at) whom?, what? - (to) cockatoo- V.p.
- (4) know (about) whom?, what? -( o) cockatoo- P.p.
- (5) no one?, what? - cockatoo- R.p.
- (6) wondering (with) whom?, what? - (with cockatoo)- etc.
In different cases, the form of immutable nouns is the same. But the case is easily determined. Case questions, as well as other members of the sentence, help with this. If such a noun has a definition expressed by an adjective, pronoun, numeral or participle, i.e. a word that changes in cases, then it will be in the form of the same case as the invariable noun itself.
Example: How much can you talk about this cockatoo?- (about) who?. how? - P.p.
§9. The syntactic role of nouns in a sentence
The mother is sitting by the window. She leafs through a magazine, looks at photographs of people and nature. My mother is a geography teacher. "Mom," I call her.
Mother - subject
Near the window - circumstance
Magazine- addition
Photo- addition
Of people- definition
nature- definition
Mother- subject
Teacher- predicate
Geography- definition
Mother- appeals, as well as introductory words, prepositions, conjunctions, particles are not members of the sentence.
test of strength
Check your understanding of the contents of this chapter.
Final test
What nouns denote individual specific objects, and not groups of homogeneous objects?
- proper names
- Common nouns
Which group of nouns has the most variety of meanings?
- proper names
- Common nouns
Is animateness-inanimateness expressed grammatically: by a set of endings?
How can you find out the gender of a noun?
- By value
- By compatibility with other words (adjectives, pronouns, past tense verbs) and by endings
What are the names of nouns that have endings characteristic of different declensions?
- Indeclinable
- Differing
What is the sign of the number of nouns good, evil, envy?
- Permanent (immutable)
- non-permanent (changing)
-
Nouns name objects, phenomena or concepts. These meanings are expressed using the categories of gender, number, and case. All nouns belong to the groups of own and common nouns. Proper nouns, which serve as the names of single objects, are opposed to common nouns, denoting generalized names of homogeneous objects.
Instruction
To determine common nouns, establish whether the named object or phenomenon belongs to the class of homogeneous objects (city, person, song). The grammatical feature of common nouns is the category of number, i.e. using them in the singular and plural (cities, people, songs). Please note that most real, abstract and collective nouns do not have a plural form (gasoline, inspiration, youth).
To determine proper nouns, determine whether the name is an individual designation of the subject, i.e. does it highlight " name» an object from a number of homogeneous (Moscow, Russia, Sidorov). Proper nouns call the names and surnames of persons and nicknames of animals (Nekrasov, Pushok, Frou-frou) - geographical and astronomical objects (America, Stockholm, Venus) - institutions, organizations, print media (Pravda newspaper, Spartak team, store "El Dorado").
Proper names, as a rule, do not change in numbers and are used only in the singular (Voronezh) or only in the plural (Sokolniki). Please note that there are exceptions to this rule. Proper nouns are used in the plural form if they denote different persons and objects that have the same name (both Americas, Petrov's namesakes) - persons who are related (the Fedorov family). Also, proper nouns can be used in the plural form, if they call a certain type of people, “highlighted” according to the qualitative characteristics of a famous literary character. Please note that in this meaning, nouns lose their sign of belonging to a group of single objects, therefore, both the use of an uppercase and a lowercase letter (Chichikovs, Famusovs, Pechorins) is acceptable.
The orthographic feature that distinguishes between proper nouns and common nouns is the use of an uppercase letter and quotation marks. At the same time, all proper names are always written with a capital letter, and the names of institutions, organizations, works, objects are used as applications and are enclosed in quotation marks (the ship "Fyodor Chaliapin", Turgenev's novel "Fathers and Sons"). Any parts of speech can be included in the application, but the first word is always capitalized (Daniel Defoe's novel The Life and Adventures of the Sailor Robinson Crusoe).
When opening a new Internet resource, one of the most difficult problems is choosing the right name. This process is further complicated by the fact that most of the monosyllabic domain names are already taken by more efficient Internet startups. But there is still a way out.
You will need
- - resource brand-book;
- - a list of theses of the semantic load of the title.
Instruction
Divide the name selection process into two successive steps: choosing a name for the resource itself and choosing a domain name. First of all, you need to find the best options for the name. It is necessary to determine the main goals and objectives of the resource, the policy for creating content and the style of presenting the material. It does not matter whether the resource is commercial or not.
Create a list of abstracts for the future name based on the accepted brand book. They should outline the informative and emotional content of the future name. There are no clear restrictions when compiling such a list: these can be nouns and verbs, proper names and common nouns, they can express emotions and feelings.
Gather an initiative group of employees related to the resource and brainstorm. To increase efficiency, it is necessary to distribute in advance to all participants the task of compiling a list of abstracts. At their own discretion, everyone should make an arbitrary written description of the most important informative features of the future site name. During the brainstorming session, ask everyone to read their list in turn and, as part of a peer discussion, select the most successful proposals.
Summarize the brainstorming and make a final list of abstracts. On their basis, each of the members of the initiative group must draw up a list of names and titles. It is best to limit the number of suggested options by quantity.
Gather suggested lists and try to find some of the best names. After that, check if the same domain names are free, including those in the rf zone. If you don't find an exact match, take a seat, otherwise try modifying the site name by using valid punctuation marks, numbers instead of letters, etc.
