Grammar Smart 3rd Edition - Princeton Review 2014

A. Nouns
Part 1. The Names of Things

“Parts of speech” is not exactly the kind of subject that usually comes up at parties—or at work either, for that matter. But even though you may not be aware of it, every time you speak or write you are nimbly (or not so nimbly) working with parts of speech, arranging your sentences according to parts of speech, and possibly even making jokes that hinge on parts of speech. What this chapter sets out to do is to broaden our already intuitive knowledge of parts of speech—to make the subject a little clearer and more useful to you.

Determining parts of speech is nothing more than determining the function a particular word has in a sentence. Different words, or groups of words, have different functions, and you will be able to avoid making errors—and put together a handsome sentence—if you are a whiz at determining parts of speech. Think of it like this: if you are going to build a table, you have to know what nails, screws, wood, nuts, and bolt look like, and also what their functions are. To understand parts of speech is to understand the materials of making sentences.

The most foolproof way to determine part of speech is to look up the word in a dictionary. The part of speech is listed, abbreviated and in italics, right after the pronunciation:

perspicacious \ ,p ə r-spə -’ka -shəs\ adj [L

perspicac-, perspicax, fr. Perspicere] (1640):

of acute mental vision or discernment: keen syn

see shrewd—perspicaciously adv—perspicaciousness n—perspicacity n

So what have we got here? Perspicacious means shrewd, smart, keen. It’s an adjective, a word used to describe something or somebody. By making small changes to the ending, you can use the word as an adverb.

Although he had poor grades, the student perspicaciously answered the questions in his oral exam.

Or as a noun.

During his oral exam, the student demonstrated a great deal of perspicacity.

Again the difference between one part of speech and another is the role the word is performing. This chapter will show you the functions of the parts of speech, and from there we will move on to the big picture: the sentence.

A. Nouns

Nouns are “people, place, and thing” words. It is easy to see that objects are nouns—things such as qualities and ideas can be nouns too—love is a noun, as is egotism, and spoilage. Nouns can be singular, when you are talking about one thing (box); and nouns can be plural, when you’re talking about more than one thing (boxes).

Being able to spot nouns is important because the subject of a sentence is always a noun or a pronoun (we’ll cover pronouns in a little while).

Quick Quiz #1

Note the nouns and pronouns in the following paragraph:

Zach Morris and Casey Jones are the hosts of a wonderful free showcase at Blast Masters Club featuring the best musicians based in the Kansas City area. Although they don’t play any instruments, Zach and Casey are great at off-the-cuff banter. The musicians featured are the cream of the crop, and the headliner is a lady who uses the stage name Tooth Fairy. She is a hard rocker who hails from New York City and she never lets you forget that she’s from the Big Apple. She has known Zach and Casey for over fifteen years and they typically all spend Sundays hanging out at a diner ten minutes away from the club.

Click here for the answers.

Rules for Nouns

1. If you aren’t sure whether a word is a noun, put a or the in front of the word, and if that makes sense, the word is a noun. (a mistake, the mood, the danger)

2. Collective nouns are nouns that stand for an entire group, but are generally thought of as singular. Family, committee, and furniture are collective, because even though each noun contains more than one element, it is thought of as one group, and is therefore singular.

The furniture has arrived. (collective noun, singular verb)

3. Nouns that have Latin endings are often mistaken for singular when they are really plural. Not every plural noun ends in -s. Watch out for the following words:

A singular subject takes a singular verb, and a plural subject takes a plural verb. Therefore:

The alumnae were whooping it up at their tenth reunion. (plural alumnae, plural verb were)

During the Michael Jackson trial, the media were out of control. (plural media, plural verb were)

4. Proper nouns are names of people, specific places, and particular groups and events. Proper nouns are always capitalized: LeBron James; Paris, Texas; Central Intelligence Agency; the War of the Roses.

5. Often, a word (or group of words) that looks like a verb acts as a noun. In other words, it is the subject of a verb. For example:

Skiing is Wanda’s favorite sport.

To know me is to love me.

Wanda’s favorite sport is a noun so even though skiing can be used as a verb (I went skiing today) in this case, skiing is acting as a noun, and is the subject of the verb is. This is called a gerund. To know is the infinitive form of the verb know. Here, to know is the subject of the verb is, so it, too, is acting as a noun. We’ll cover this more in depth in Part 2.

Quick Quiz #2

In the following sentences, note the nouns and label them singular, plural, or proper:

1. The aliens sat on my Subaru and drank fruit juice.

2. The dance committee was considering all-black decorations for the prom.

3. My lunch is crawling with bacteria!

4. Swimming is very relaxing.

5. On Wednesday, Wanda went to Wichita to wait for Wilbur.