§1. general characteristics noun
A noun is an independent significant part of speech.
1. Grammatical meaning
- "item".
Nouns include words that answer questions:
Who? , What?
2. Morphological characteristics:
- constants - common/proper nouns, animate/inanimate, gender, type of declension;
- changeable - number, case.
3. Syntactic role in a sentence any, especially frequently: subject and object.
Guys love vacations.
As an address and introductory words, the noun is not a member of the sentence:
- Sergey!- Mom calls me from the yard.
(Sergey- appeal)
Unfortunately, it's time to go do homework.
(Unfortunately- introductory word)
§2. Morphological features of nouns
Nouns have a set of morphological features. Some of them are permanent (or unchangeable). Others, on the contrary, are impermanent (or changeable). Unchangeable features relate to the entire word as a whole, and changeable features refer to the forms of the word. So noun Natalia- animate, own, f.r., 1 text. No matter what form it takes, these signs will remain. Noun Natalia may be in the form of units. and many more numbers, in different cases. Number and case are inconsistent features of nouns. In the illustration, dotted lines lead to such unstable or variable morphological characters. It is necessary to learn to distinguish which signs are constant and which are not constant.
§3. Common nouns - proper nouns
This is the division of nouns according to their meaning. Common nouns denote homogeneous objects, i.e. any object from their series, and proper nouns name a separate specific object.
Compare nouns:
- child, country, river, lake, fairy tale, turnip - common nouns
- Alexey, Russia, Volga, Baikal, “Turnip” - 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, names of animals, geographical names, names of works of literature and art, etc.: Alexander, Sashka, Sashenka, Zhuchka, Ob, Ural, “Teenager”, “Kolobok” and so on.
§4. Animation - inanimateness
Animate nouns name “living” objects, while inanimate nouns name non-living objects.
- Animated: mother, father, child, dog, ant, Kolobok (fairy tale hero 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. fall. = born. fall.), and for inanimate nouns wine form pad. matches the form. pad.: I love books and films (vin. pad. = im. pad.) - singular in animate nouns of the masculine gender wine form pad. coincides with the form of the genus. pad.:
The fox saw Kolobok (vin. fall. = born. fall.), and for inanimate nouns the masculine gender wine form pad. matches the form. pad.: I baked a bun (vin. pad. = named pad.)
The remaining nouns have the forms im., vin. and family cases differ.
Means, sign of animate-inanimate can be determined not only based on the meaning, but also on the set of word endings.
§5. Genus
Gender of nouns- This is a constant morphological feature. Nouns do not change according to gender.
There are three genders in Russian: male, female And average. The sets of endings for nouns of different genders differ.
In animate nouns, classification as masculine or feminine is motivated by gender, since words denote male or female persons: father - mother, brother - sister, husband - wife, man - woman, boy - girl etc. The grammatical sign of gender is correlated with gender.
For inanimate nouns, the belonging of a word to one of the three genders is not motivated. Words ocean, sea, river, lake, pond- of different kinds, and the gender is not determined by the meaning of the words.
The morphological indicator of the genus is the endings.
If the word ends:
a, y or a, ohm, e in the singular and s, ov, am, s or ow, ami, ah in plural , then it is a masculine noun
a, s, e, y, oh, e singular and s, am or s, ami, ah in the plural, it is a feminine noun
oh, a, y, oh, ohm, e in the singular and a, am, a, ami, 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 because they can refer to both male and female persons. These are the words: smart girl glutton, sleepyhead, greedy, crybaby, ignorant, ignorant, mean, bully, slob, mean, bungler, scoundrel, daredevil and so on. 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's so smart! AND: He's so smart! The meaning of the gender of an animate person can be determined by the form of the pronoun (as in our example) or adjective or 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 them are masculine nouns: doctor, driver, engineer, economist, geologist, philologist and so on. But they can designate both male and female persons. My mother - 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 the masculine and feminine gender: The doctor has arrived. AND: The doctor has arrived.
How to determine the gender of unchangeable words?
There are unchangeable 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 not difficult if you understand what the word means. Let's look at examples:
Monsieur - Madame- for words denoting an animate person, gender corresponds to gender.
Kangaroo, chimpanzee- words naming animals, male.
Tbilisi, Sukhumi- words - names of cities - male.
Congo, Zimbabwe- words - names of states - neuter.
Mississippi, Yangtze- words - names of rivers - female.
Coat, muffler- words denoting inanimate objects are more common neuter.
Are there any exceptions? Eat. Therefore, it is recommended to be careful about unchangeable words and remember how they are used. Gender is expressed not by the ending (indeclinable words do not have 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 deep.
Short adjectives in the form of zh.r. indicate that the word Mississippi w.r.
§6. Declension
Declension is a type of word change. Nouns change according to number and case. Number and case are variable morphological features. Depending on what forms the word has in different numbers and cases, according to 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, unchangeable morphological feature of nouns.
The 1st declension includes feminine and masculine words with endings A, I in its initial form.
Examples: mom, dad, grandpa, water, earth, Anna, Anya, lecture - ending [a].
The 2nd declension includes masculine words with zero endings and neuter words with endings O, e
in its initial form.
Examples: father, brother, house, Alexander, sea, lake, building - ending [e] , genius, Alexey.
The 3rd declension includes feminine words ending in zero in its initial form.
Examples: mother, mouse, night, news, rye, lie.
Initial form- this is the form of the word in which it is usually recorded in dictionaries. For nouns, this is the nominative singular form.
Pay attention to the words traditionally called nouns on yeah, yeah, th : lecture, building, genius.
How to correctly mark the endings in such 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 - does a vowel represent two sounds? Lecture- [iya’a], building- [iy’e], and the sound [y’] is the last consonant of the base. So, in words like lecture ending [a], in words like building- [e], and in words like genius- zero ending.
Therefore, feminine nouns: lecture, station, demonstration belong to the 1st declension, and masculine: genius and average: building- to the 2nd.
One more group of words requires comment. These are the so-called neuter nouns me , words way and child. These are indeclinable nouns.
Indeclinable nouns- these are words that have endings characteristic of forms of different declensions.
There are few such words. They are all very ancient. Some of them are common in today's speech.
List of nouns on My name: stirrup, tribe, seed, burden, udder, crown, time, name, flame, banner.
For their spelling, see All spelling. Spelling nouns
§7. Number
Number- this is a morphological feature, changeable for some nouns and unchangeable, constant for others.
The overwhelming number of Russian nouns vary in number. For example: house - houses, girl - girls, elephant - elephants, night - nights. Nouns inflecting by number have both singular and singular forms. plural 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: person - people, child - children, kitten - kittens.
The minority of Russian nouns do not change in number, but have 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, goodness
- some of our own, namely: geographical names: Russia, Suzdal, St. Petersburg
Nouns that have a plural form:
- collective: shoots
- real: cream, cabbage soup
- abstract (or abstract): chores, elections, twilight
- some proper, namely geographical names: Carpathians, Himalayas
- some specific (object) watches, sleds, as well as a group of nouns denoting objects that consist of two parts: skis, skates, glasses, gates
Remember:
Most objects denoted by nouns that have only singular or plural forms cannot be counted.
For such nouns, number is an unchangeable morphological feature.
§8. Case
Case- this is a non-constant, 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 which case form the noun is in. Since, as you know, nouns can be 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. - by whom?, what?
- P.p. - (About who about what?
You see that for animate nouns the questions vin.p are the same. and family etc., and for the inanimate - them. p. and wine P.
To avoid mistakes 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.), person(vin. p.).
Do all nouns change by case?
No, not all. Nouns, which are called unchangeable, 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). It's interesting with a cockatoo (6).
Word cockatoo occurred in this context 6 times:
- (1) who?, what? - cockatoo- I.p.
- (2) approaching (to) whom?, what? - (to) cockatoo- D.p.
- (3) looking (at) who?, what? - (on) a cockatoo- V.p.
- (4) know (about) whom?, what? - ( o) cockatoo- P.p.
- (5) no who?, what? - cockatoo- R.p.
- (6) interesting (with) who?, what? - (from cockatoo)- etc.
In different cases, the form of unchangeable nouns is the same. But the case is determined easily. Case questions help with this, as well as other parts of the sentence. If such a noun has a definition expressed by an adjective, pronoun, numeral or participle, i.e. a word that changes according to cases, then it will be in the form of the same case as the unchangeable noun itself.
Example: How long can you talk about this cockatoo?- (about) whom?. how? - P.p.
§9. Syntactic role of nouns in a sentence
Mother sits by the window. She leafs through a magazine, looking at photographs of people and nature. My mother is a geography teacher. “Mom,” I call her.
Mother - subject
Near the window - circumstance
Magazine- addition
Photos- addition
Of people- definition
Nature- definition
Mother- subject
Teacher- predicate
Geographies- definition
Mother- appeals, as well as introductory words, prepositions, conjunctions, particles are not members of the sentence.
Test of strength
Check your understanding of this chapter.
Final test
What nouns denote individual specific objects, rather than groups of homogeneous objects?
- Proper names
- Common nouns
Which group of nouns has the most variety in meaning?
- Proper names
- Common nouns
Is animate-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?
- Unbowed
- Divergent
What is the sign of number in nouns? good, evil, envy?
- Permanent (unchangeable)
- Impermanent (changeable)
-
A proper name is Name a noun expressed by the word or, naming a specific object or phenomenon. Unlike a common noun, which immediately denotes a whole object or phenomenon, Name own is intended for one, very specific object of this class. For example, "" is a common noun Name is a noun, while “War and Peace” is a proper noun. The word "river" represents Name a common noun, but “Cupid” is Name proper. Proper names can be names of people, patronymics, titles of books, songs, films, geographical names. Proper names are written with a capital letter. Some types of proper names require quotation marks. This applies to literary works (“Eugene Onegin”), paintings (“Mona Lisa”), films (“Only Old Men Go to Battle”), theaters (“Variety”), and other types of nouns. When translating proper names into other languages, transcription methods are used: Gogolya-street (Gogol Street), radio Mayak (Radio “Mayak”). Proper names are not specially distinguished. Proper names and common nouns are not separated from each other by an impenetrable wall. Proper names can turn into common nouns, and vice versa. For example, “avatar” was just a common noun until Avatar was made. Now this word, depending on the context, plays the role of a common noun or a proper noun. “Schumacher” is the surname of a certain racing driver, but gradually all lovers of fast driving began to be called “Schumachers.” Trademarks that are unique producers of a certain type of product or simply monopolists can become common nouns from proper names. A striking example is the company Xerox, which produces electrophotographic copiers. This company still exists today, but “copiers” are now called all copiers in general.
Sources:
- how to write proper names
Tip 2: How to determine whether a proper name or a common noun
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 proper and common nouns. Proper nouns, which serve as names of individual objects, are contrasted with common nouns, which denote generalized names of homogeneous objects.
Instructions
For determining proper nouns determine whether the name is an individual designation of the item, i.e. does it make it stand out? Name» an object from a number of similar ones (Moscow, Russia, Sidorov). Proper nouns name first and last names of persons and names of animals (Nekrasov, Pushok, Fru-fru); geographical and astronomical objects (America, Stockholm, Venus); , organizations, print media (Pravda newspaper, Spartak team, Eldorado store).
Proper names, as a rule, do not change in number 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 with the same names (both Americas, namesake Petrovs); persons who are related (the Fedorov family). Also, proper nouns can be used in the plural form if they name a certain type of people, “selected” according to the qualitative characteristics of a famous literary character. Please note that in this meaning, nouns lose the attribute of belonging to a group of individual objects, therefore it is acceptable to use both capital and lowercase letters (Chichikovs, Famusovs, Pechorins).
A spelling feature that distinguishes proper nouns is the use of capital letters and. Moreover, all proper names are always letters, and the names of institutions, organizations, works, objects are used as appendices and are enclosed in quotation marks (the motor ship “Fedor Shalyapin”, Turgenev’s novel “Fathers and Sons”). The application may include any part of speech, but the first word is always capitalized (Daniel Defoe’s novel “The Life and Amazing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe”).
A noun in Russian has different distinctive features. To show the peculiarities of the emergence and use of certain linguistic units, they are divided into common nouns and proper nouns.
Instructions
Common nouns are nouns that denote the name of certain objects and phenomena that have a common set of characteristics. These objects or phenomena belong to any class, but in themselves do not carry any special indications of this class. In linguistics, a common noun is also called an appellative.
Common nouns are signs of linguistic concepts and are contrasted with proper names - which are used as names and nicknames of living beings or names and names of objects and phenomena. When common nouns transform into proper nouns, they lose the name of the linguistic concept (for example, the name “Gum” from the word “gum” - “right”).
There are several types of common nouns, including concrete (table), abstract or abstract (love), material or material (sugar), and collective ().
Common nouns can denote not only classes of objects, but also any individual objects within a given class. This phenomenon occurs when the individual attributes of an object lose meaning, for example: “Don’t tease the dog, otherwise it will bite you.” In this case, the word "dog" means any dog, not any specific one. This also includes situations that describe only one object of a certain class, for example: “Meet me at noon on the corner,” that is, the interlocutors know which corner they are talking about we're talking about. Also, common nouns are used to describe the individual characteristics of an object using additional definitions, for example: “I am the day when I first saw her” - highlighting a specific day among others.
Common nouns are closely related to proper names. For example, common nouns can become proper in the form of names, nicknames and nicknames (for example, “Kalita” as the nickname of Prince Ivan Danilovich), and proper nouns can become common nouns to denote homogeneous objects. Such transitions are called eponyms and are usually used in a derogatory or humorous sense (for example, “Aesculapius” is the collective name for all doctors, “Pele” is for football fans, and “Schumacher” is for fans of fast driving). According to the rules of the Russian language, proper names are accepted with , and common nouns - in capital letters.
Each person uses several hundred nouns in his speech every day. However, not everyone will be able to answer the question of which category this or that word belongs to: proper names or common nouns, and whether there is a difference between them. Meanwhile, not only written literacy depends on this simple knowledge, but also the ability to correctly understand what is read, because often, only by reading a word, you can understand whether it is a name or just the name of a thing.
What is this
Before you figure out which nouns are called proper nouns and which are common nouns, it’s worth remembering what they are.
Nouns are words that answer the questions “What?”, “Who?” and denoting the name of things or persons (“table”, “person”), they change according to declensions, genders, numbers and cases. In addition, words related to this part of speech are proper/common nouns.
Concept about and own
Apart from rare exceptions, all nouns belong to the category of either proper or common nouns.
Common nouns include the summarized names of homogeneous things or phenomena that may differ from each other in some ways, but will still be called one word. For example, the noun "toy" is common noun, although it generalizes the names of different objects: cars, dolls, bears and other things from this group. In Russian, as in most other languages, common nouns are always written with a small letter.
nouns are names of individuals, prominent things, places or persons. For example, the word “doll” is a common noun that names a whole category of toys, but the name of the popular doll brand “Barbie” is a proper noun. All proper names are written with capital letters.
It is worth noting that common nouns, unlike proper nouns, carry a certain lexical meaning. For example, when they say “doll”, it becomes clear that we are talking about a toy, but when they simply call the name “Masha”, outside the context of a common noun, it is not clear who or what it is - a girl, a doll, the name of a brand, a hair salon or a chocolate bar.Ethnonyms
As mentioned above, nouns can be proper and common nouns. So far, linguists have not yet come to a consensus on the issue of the connection between these two categories. There are two common views on this issue: according to one, there is a clear dividing line between common and proper nouns; according to another, the dividing line between these categories is not absolute due to the frequent transition of nouns from one category to another. Therefore, there are so-called “intermediate” words that do not relate to either proper or common nouns, although they have characteristics of both categories. Such nouns include ethnonyms - words meaning the names of peoples, nationalities, tribes and other similar concepts.
Common nouns: examples and types
The vocabulary of the Russian language contains the most common nouns. All of them are usually divided into four types.
1. Specific - denote objects or phenomena that can be counted (people, birds and animals, flowers). For example: “adult”, “child”, “thrush”, “shark”, “ash”, “violet”. Specific common nouns almost always have a plural and singular form and are combined with quantitative numerals: “an adult - two adults”, “one violet - five violets”.
2. Abstract - denote concepts, feelings, objects that cannot be counted: “love”, “health”, “intelligence”. Most often, this type of common noun is used only in the singular. If, for one reason or another, a noun of this type acquires a plural form (“fear - fears”), it loses its abstract meaning.
3. Real - denote substances that are homogeneous in composition and do not have separate objects: chemical elements(mercury), food (pasta), medicines (citramon) and other similar concepts. Real nouns cannot be counted, but they can be measured (a kilogram of pasta). Words of this type of common noun have only one form of number: either plural or singular: “oxygen” is singular, “cream” is plural.
4. Collective nouns mean a collection of similar objects or persons, as a single, indivisible whole: “brotherhood”, “humanity”. Nouns of this type cannot be counted and are used only in the singular form. However, with them you can use the words “a little”, “several”, “few” and similar ones: a lot of children, a lot of infantry and others.
Proper nouns: examples and types
Depending on the lexical meaning, the following types of proper nouns are distinguished:
1. Anthroponyms - first names, surnames, pseudonyms, nicknames and nicknames of people: Vasilyeva Anastasia,
2. Theonyms - names and titles of deities: Zeus, Buddha.
3. Zoonyms - nicknames and nicknames of animals: the dog Barbos, the cat Marie.
4. All types of toponyms - geographical names, cities (Volgograd), reservoirs (Baikal), streets (Pushkin) and so on.
5. Aeronautonims - the names of various space and aircraft: spaceship"Vostok", interorbital station "Mir".
6. Names of works of art, literature, cinema, television programs: “Mona Lisa”, “Crime and Punishment”, “Vertical”, “Jumble”.
7. Names of organizations, websites, brands: “Oxford”, “Vkontakte”, “Milavitsa”.
8. Names of holidays and other social events: Christmas, Independence Day.
9. Titles unique phenomena Nature: Hurricane Isabel.
10. Names of unique buildings and objects: Rodina cinema, Olimpiysky sports complex.Transition of proper into common nouns and vice versa
Since language is not something abstract and is constantly influenced by both external and internal factors, words often change their category: proper nouns become common nouns, and common nouns become proper nouns. Examples of this occur quite often. So the natural phenomenon “frost” - from a common noun turned into a proper noun, the surname Moroz. The process of turning common nouns into proper ones is called onymization.
At the same time, the name of the famous German physicist who was the first to discover X-ray radiation, in colloquial speech Russian language has long ago become the name for the study of something using the “X-ray” radiation he discovered. This process is called appeal, and such words are called eponyms.
How to differentiate
In addition to semantic differences, there are also grammatical ones that allow one to clearly distinguish between proper and common nouns. The Russian language is quite practical in this regard. The category of common nouns, unlike proper nouns, as a rule, has both plural and singular forms: “artist - artists.”
At the same time, another category is almost always used only in the singular: Picasso is the artist’s surname, singular. However, there are exceptions when proper nouns can be used in the plural. Examples of this name, originally used in the plural: village Big Boars. In this case, these proper nouns are often deprived of the singular: Carpathian mountains.
Sometimes proper names can be used in the plural if they denote different persons or phenomena, but with identical names. For example: There are three Xenias in our class.How do you spell
If with the writing of common nouns everything is quite simple: they are all written with a small letter, and otherwise you should adhere to the usual rules of the Russian language, then the other category has some nuances that you need to know in order to correctly write proper nouns. Examples of incorrect spelling can often be found not only in the notebooks of careless schoolchildren, but also in the documents of adults and respectable people.
To avoid such mistakes, you should learn a few simple rules:
1. All proper names, without exception, are written with capital letters, especially when it comes to the nicknames of legendary heroes: Richard the Lionheart. If a given name, surname or place name consists of two or more nouns, regardless of whether they are written separately or hyphenated, each of these words must begin with a capital letter. An interesting example may serve as a nickname for the main villain of the Harry Potter epic - the Dark Lord. Afraid to call him by name, the heroes called the evil wizard “He Who Must Not Be Named.” In this case, all 4 words are written with capital letters, since this is the character's nickname.
2. If the name or title contains articles, particles and other auxiliary particles of speech, they are written with a small letter: Albrecht von Graefe, Leonardo da Vinci, but Leonardo DiCaprio. In the second example, the particle “di” is written with a capital letter, since in the original language it is written together with the surname Leonardo DiCaprio. This principle applies to many proper names of foreign origin. In eastern names indicating social status particles “bey”, “zul”, “zade”, “pasha”, and the like, regardless of whether they are in the middle of the word or written at the end with a small letter. The same principle applies to writing proper names with particles in other languages. German “von”, “zu”, “auf”; Spanish "de" Dutch “van”, “ter”; French “deux”, “du”, “de la”.
3. The particles “San-”, “Saint-”, “Saint-”, “Ben-” located at the beginning of a surname of foreign origin are written with a capital letter and a hyphen (Saint-Gemain); after O, there is always an apostrophe and the next letter is capital (O’Henry). The part “Mc-” should be written as a hyphen, but it is often written together because the spelling is closer to the original: McKinley, but McLain.
Having once dealt with this rather simple topic (what a noun is, types of nouns and examples), you can once and for all rid yourself of stupid, but quite unpleasant mistakes in spelling and the need to constantly look in the dictionary to check yourself.
The noun is one of the most important parts of speech both in Russian and in many other Indo-European languages. In most languages, nouns are divided into proper and common nouns. This division is very important, since these categories different rules spelling.
The study of nouns in Russian schools begins in the second grade. Already at this age, children are able to understand the difference between proper names and common nouns.
Students usually learn this material easily. The main thing is to choose interesting exercises in which the rules are well remembered. In order to correctly distinguish nouns, a child must be able to generalize and assign familiar objects to a specific group (for example: “dishes”, “animals”, “toys”).
Own
Towards proper names in modern Russian language It is traditionally customary to include names and nicknames of people, animal names and geographical names.
Here are typical examples:
A proper name can answer the question “who?” if we are talking about people and animals, as well as the question “what?” if we are talking about geographical names.
Common nouns
Unlike proper nouns, common nouns do not denote a name specific person and not the name of a specific locality, but a generalized name of a large group of objects. Here are classic examples:
- Boy, girl, man, woman;
- River, village, village, town, aul, kishlak, city, capital, country;
- Animal, insect, bird;
- Writer, poet, doctor, teacher.
Common nouns can answer both the question “who?” and the question “what?”. Typically, in discrimination exercises, primary schoolchildren are asked to choose suitable common noun for a group of proper names, For example:
You can build a task and vice versa: match proper names to common nouns.
- What dog names do you know?
- What are your favorite girl names?
- What is a cow's name?
- What are the names of the villages you visited?
Such exercises help children quickly learn the difference. When students have learned to distinguish one noun from another quickly and correctly, they can move on to learning spelling rules. These rules are simple, and students primary school absorb them well. For example, a simple and memorable rhyme can help children with this: “First names, last names, nicknames, cities - everything is always written with a capital letter!”
Spelling Rules
In accordance with the rules of the modern Russian language, all proper names are written only with a capital letter. This rule is typical not only for Russian, but also for most other languages of Eastern and Western Europe. Capital letter at the beginning names, surnames, nicknames and geographical names are used to emphasize respectful attitude towards each person, animal, and locality.
Common nouns, on the contrary, are written with a lowercase letter. However, exceptions to this rule are possible. This usually happens in fiction. For example, when Boris Zakhoder translated Alan Milne’s book “Winnie the Pooh and All-All-All,” the Russian writer deliberately used capital letters in the spelling of some common nouns, for example: “Big Forest”, “Great Expedition”, “Farewell Evening”. Zakhoder did this in order to emphasize the importance of certain phenomena and events for fairy-tale heroes.This often occurs both in Russian and translated literature. This phenomenon can be seen especially often in adapted folklore - legends, fairy tales, epics. For example: “Magic Bird”, “Rejuvenating Apple”, “Dense Forest”, “ Gray wolf».
In some languages, capitalization is capitalization- in the writing of names can be used in different cases. For example, in Russian and some European languages (French, Spanish) it is traditional to write the names of months and days of the week with a small letter. However, in English language These common nouns are always written with a capital letter only. Capitalization of common nouns is also found in German.
When proper names become common nouns
In modern Russian there are situations when proper names can become common nouns. This happens quite often. Here's a classic example. Zoilus is the name of an ancient Greek critic who was very skeptical about many works of contemporary art and frightened authors with his caustic negative reviews. When antiquity became a thing of the past, his name was forgotten.
Once Pushkin noticed that one of his works was received very ambiguously by literary critics. And in one of his poems, he ironically called these critics “my zoiles,” implying that they were bile and sarcastic. Since then, the proper name “Zoil” has become a common noun and is used when talking about a person who unfairly criticizes or scolds something.
Many proper names from the works of Nikolai Vasilyevich Gogol have become household names. For example, “plushkins” are often called stingy people, and “boxes” - elderly women of narrow minds. And those who like to have their head in the clouds and are not at all interested in reality are often called “Manila”. All these names came into the Russian language from the famous work “ Dead Souls", where the writer brilliantly showed a whole gallery of landowner characters.
Proper names become common nouns quite often. However, the opposite also happens. A common noun can become a proper noun if it turns into the name of an animal or a nickname for a person. For example, a black cat may be called “Gypsy”, and a faithful dog may be called “Friend”.Naturally, these words will be written with a capital letter, according to the rules for writing proper names. This usually happens if a nickname or nickname is given because a person (animal) has some pronounced qualities. For example, Donut was so nicknamed because he had excess weight and looked like a donut, and Syrupchik - because he really loved drinking sweet water with syrup.
It is very important to distinguish proper names from common nouns. If junior schoolchildren If they don’t learn this, they won’t be able to correctly use capitalization when writing proper names. In this regard, the study of common and proper nouns should occupy an important place in school curriculum Russian as a native and as a foreign language.
Since school, we remember the difference between a proper name and a common noun: the former is written with a capital letter! Masha, Rostov, Leo Tolstoy, Polkan, Danube - compare with a girl, a city, a count, a dog, a river. And only this? Perhaps Rosenthal's help will be needed to figure it out.
Proper name– a noun indicating a specific subject, person, animal, object in order to distinguish them from a number of homogeneous ones
Common noun– a noun that names a class, type, category of an object, action or state, without taking into account their individuality.
These categories of nouns are usually studied in the 5th grade, and schoolchildren remember once and for all that the difference between a proper name and a common noun is in the uppercase or lowercase letter at the beginning. It is enough for most to understand that first names, surnames, nicknames, names of topographical and astronomical objects, unique phenomena, as well as objects and objects of culture (including literary works) refer to their own. All the rest are household names, and there are much more of the latter.
Comparison
Proper names are always secondary and secondary, and not every object or subject requires their presence. For example, call natural phenomena, with the exception of typhoons and huge hurricanes destructive force, not accepted and useless. You can describe and specify your instructions in different ways. So, speaking about a neighbor, you can say his name, or you can give a description: a teacher, in a red jacket, lives in apartment number 7, an athlete. It becomes clear who we are talking about. However, only proper nouns can unambiguously define individuality (there may be many teachers and athletes nearby, but Arkady Petrovich is alone), and their relationship with the object is closer. Common nouns denote concepts or categories.
Proper names are most often random, in no way connected with the characteristics of the object, and if they are connected (the cat Zlyuka, the river Bystrinka), it is very ambiguous: the cat can turn out to be good-natured, and the river can turn out to be slow-flowing. Common nouns name and describe an object; these nouns necessarily carry lexical information.
Only animate and inanimate objects that have significance for a person and require a personal approach are called by proper names. So, an ordinary person sees the stars at night, and an amateur astronomer, for example, sees the constellation Taurus; for the Minister of Education, schoolchildren are just schoolchildren, but for class teacher 3 “B” – Vasya Petrov, Petya Vasechkin, Masha Startseva.
We have already determined the difference between a proper name and a common noun from a semantic point of view. Grammatically, they can be distinguished using the plural form: the former are not used in the plural (Moscow, Lev Nikolaevich, dog Sharik). An exception is made for geographical names that do not have a singular number (Velikiye Luki), as well as in the case of unification of persons based on kinship or belonging to a homogeneous group (the Karamazov brothers; all Peters are now birthday people; there are many Ivanovkas in Russia).
When processing foreign texts, proper names are not translated; they are written either in practical transcription (preserving phonetics and as close as possible to the original) or in transliteration (the word is transferred character by character in accordance with international rules).
And, of course, lowercase letters for common nouns, uppercase letters for proper nouns. Have we already talked about this?