Count and non-count nouns

Native speakers of English do not think much about grammar since they have internalized the grammar rules by speaking the language as their mother tongue. It is only speakers for whom English is not the mother tongue that try hard to memorize the rules of grammar in order to speak English well. However, the rules are 'not hard and fast' so to speak.

For example, how do you determine whether a noun is a count noun or a non-count noun? For new readers of my articles, let me recall what I talked about nouns. A noun is a word that is used as a name. It can be the name of:

A person: Robinson
A place: Washington
An animal: lion
Or a thing.

It is the 'thing' that has been troubling non-native users of English. Anything can be a thing. A physical object can be a thing, an idea can be a thing, a living thing can be a thing and so on.

Once you know what thing you are talking about, you have got to find out if it is a count noun or a non-count noun.

A count noun is a word that has singular and plural forms. You cannot determine whether a noun is countable or not countable by have your idea of the thing. For example, furniture is a non-count noun. By the way, furniture means 'a set of things such as chairs, table and sofas used in a room'. When you say furniture you do not mean one piece of it, but the whole set. Thus it is not a countable noun.

Is information a count noun? Let us find out how the dictionary defines the word: facts or details about a thing you are talking about. While fact or detail is a count noun, information is not. Thus you can say a fact or facts or a detail or details but not an information or informations

So how to find out whether a noun is countable or not countable?The only way you find out is by looking up a good dictionary. In most cases, it is the non-count nouns that give problems. However, more difficult are the words that are count in some contexts, and non-count in some contexts. So next time when you are in doubt about a noun, look up a good dictionary.

It is only when you know whether a noun is count or non-count, can you use words such as a, an, few, a few, little, a little, much and many correctly.

ganeshan ramachandran