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The noun and its categories

The noun is expression that refer to a person, place, thing, event, substance, quality or idea. It serve as the subject or object of a verb, and the object of a preposition. Nouns can be a subject or an object of a verb, can be modified by an adjective and can take an article or determiner.

English has three genders for nouns and pronouns: masculine, feminine, and neuter. A noun that refers to something with male sexual organs is masculine, a noun that refers to something with female sexual organs is feminine and most other nouns are neuter by default.

Examples: Different words: Masculine- man, father, uncle, boy, husband; Feminine- woman, mother, aunt, girl, wife.

Different forms: Masculine- actor, prince, hero, waiter, widower; Feminine- actress, princess, heroine, waitress, widow

Some

nouns can be used for either a masculine or a feminine subject. Examples: cousin, teenager, teacher, doctor, cook, student, parent, friend, relation, colleague, partner, leader.
In some cases nouns describing things are given gender. Examples: love my car. She (the car) is my greatest passion.

Number is the form of the noun which shows whether one or more that one object is meant. Some nouns in English may have the singular and the plural forms (room-rooms, worker-workers). Other nouns are used either only in the singular (freedom, progress, milk) or only on the plural (spectacles, goods)
The plural of most nouns is built up by means of the suffix -s or -es. It is pronounced [z] after vowels and voiced consonants (days, dogs, birds), [s] after voiceless consonants (books, coats) and [iz] after sibilants (horses, roses).

Nouns ending in -y preceded by a consonant change the -y into -ies (story-stories, fly-flies). But if a noun ends in -y preceded by a vowel, only -s is added (key-keys, boy-boys, day-days)

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