Inanimate common noun neuter noun. Animate and inanimate nouns

The concept of a noun. Signs of nouns. Noun categories

1. Noun — independent part speech that denotes a subject and answers questions Who? What?

2. Basic features of a noun.

General grammatical meaning - this is the meaning of the subject, that is, everything that can be said about: who is this? or what's this? This is the only part of speech that can mean anything, namely:

1) names of specific things and objects (house, tree, notebook, book, briefcase, bed, lamp);

2) names of living beings (man, engineer, girl, boy, deer, mosquito);

3) names of various substances (oxygen, gasoline, lead, sugar, salt);

4) names various phenomena nature and public life(storm, frost, rain, holiday, war);

5) names abstract properties and signs (freshness, whiteness, blueness);

6) names of abstract actions and states (waiting, killing, running).

Morphological characteristics a noun is gender, number, case, declension. Nouns

1) belong to one of four genders - masculine, feminine, neuter, general, but do not vary by gender: ocean, river, sea; cm. ;

2) change by numbers: ocean - oceans, river - rivers, sea - seas;

3) change by case: ocean - ocean, ocean, ocean etc.; cm.

Changing by cases and numbers is called declination. Cm.

The initial form of the noun is the nominative singular.

Syntactic features: in a sentence, nouns most often act as subjects or objects, but can be any other members of the sentence:

Book makes a person the master of the universe (P. Pavlenko) - subject ;
The whole life of mankind settled in the book (A. Herzen) - addition ;
Book - storage knowledge (B. Polevoy) - nominal part compound predicate ;
Dampness from the earth my side began to feel cold (A. Gaidar) - inconsistent definition ;
Above gray-haired plain of the sea, the wind is driving up the clouds (M. Lermontov) - circumstance of place ;
The people will not forget - winner their selfless heroes (V. Lebedev-Kumach) - application .

A noun in a sentence can act as appeals(not part of the sentence): Lucy , I'm waiting for you!

3. According to the nature of the lexical meaning, nouns are divided into two categories:

• common nouns- these are nouns that name a class of homogeneous objects: table, boy, bird, spring;

• proper nouns- these are nouns that name single (individual) objects, which include first names, patronymics, last names of people, names of animals, names of cities, rivers, seas, oceans, lakes, mountains, deserts ( geographical names), names of books, paintings, films, magazines, newspapers, performances, names of ships, trains, various organizations, historical events and so on.: Alexander, Zhuchka, Russia, Astrakhan, Volga, Baikal, “The Captain's Daughter”.

Note. Proper names nouns have a number of features.

1) Proper names can consist of one word ( Moscow, Caspian Sea, Caucasus, “Mtsyri”) or from several words ( Nizhny Novgorod, New Orleans, Vasily Andreevich Zhukovsky, “War and Peace”, East Siberian Sea).

2) Proper names are written with capital letters (Tula, Alps).

3) Titles (titles) of books, newspapers, magazines, films, paintings, ships, trains, etc. are written with a capital letter and, in addition, are highlighted with quotation marks ( novel “Eugene Onegin”, painting “Morning in the Forest”, motor ship “Vasily Surikov”).

4) Proper names are not used in the plural and are not combined with numerals (except in cases of designation various items and persons with the same names: We have two Iras and three Olyas in our class.). City of Naberezhnye Chelny.

5) Proper nouns can turn into common nouns, and common nouns into proper nouns, for example: Narcissus(the name of a handsome young man in ancient Greek mythology) - narcissus(flower); Boston(city in USA) - Boston(wool fabric), Boston(slow waltz), Boston (card game); labor - newspaper "Trud".

4. According to their meaning, nouns are divided into four main categories:

• specific are nouns that call specific items animate and inanimate nature (varies by numbers, combined with cardinal numerals). For example: table ( tables, two tables), student ( students, two students), mountain ( mountains, two mountains);

• real are nouns that call various substances, homogeneous mass something (they have only one form of number - singular or plural; they are not combined with cardinal numerals; they are combined with words a lot, a little, and also with different units measurements). For example: air (no plural; you can't say: two air, but you can: a lot of air, little air; two cubic meters of air), dirt (no plural; cannot say: two dirt, but you can: a lot of dirt, a little dirt; two kilograms of dirt), ink (no singular; cannot say: five ink, but you can: a lot of ink, a little ink, two hundred grams of ink), sawdust (there is no singular; you cannot say: five sawdust, but you can: a lot of sawdust, little sawdust; half a kilogram of sawdust);

• abstract (abstract)- these are nouns that name abstract phenomena that are perceived mentally (they have only a singular or only a plural, and are not combined with cardinal numerals). For example: compassion (there is no plural; you cannot say: two compassions), warmth (no plural; cannot say: two heats), bitterness (no plural; cannot say: two bitternesses), troubles (there is no singular; you cannot say: five troubles);

• collective are nouns that name a set identical items as one whole (they only have a singular form; they are not combined with cardinal numbers). For example: youth (there is no plural, although it means many; you cannot say: two youth), teaching (there is no plural, although it means many; you cannot say: two teachers), beast (there is no plural, although it means many; you cannot say: two animals), foliage (there is no plural, although it means many; you cannot say: two leaves);

• single are nouns that are a type of material noun. These nouns name one instance of those objects that make up the set. For example: pearl - pearl, potato - potato, sand - grain of sand, pea - pea, snow - snowflake, straw - straw.

5. According to the type of objects denoted, nouns are divided into two categories:

• animate nouns that name objects of living nature, they are asked the question who?: father, mother, nightingale, cat, fly, worm;

• inanimate nouns that name objects of inanimate nature, they are asked the question what?: country, rock, laughter, snow, window.

Note. Sometimes it can be difficult to distinguish between animate and inanimate nouns.

1) Mainly animate nouns are masculine and female gender. There are very few animate neuter nouns ( child, animal, face meaning "person" mammal, insect, monster, creature in the meaning of “living organism”, monster).

2) Animate and inanimate nouns have features in declension:

• animate nouns have the plural form accusative case matches the shape genitive case(for animate nouns male 2nd declension and in singular): V.p. plural = R.p. plural

Wed: mother - I see mothers(plural V.p.), no mothers(plural R.p.); father - I see fathers(plural V.p.), no fathers(plural R.p.); I see my father(singular v.p.), no father(units R.p.);

• in the plural form of inanimate nouns the accusative case coincides with the form nominative case(for masculine nouns of the 2nd declension and in the singular, the form of the accusative case coincides with the form of the nominative case): V.p. plural = I.p. plural

Wed: country - I see countries(plural V.p.), there are countries here(plural I.p.); stone - I see stones(plural V.p.), there are stones here(plural I.p.); I see a stone(singular v.p.), there is a stone here(singular part I.p.).

3) The division of nouns into animate and inanimate does not always coincide with scientific presentation about alive and inanimate nature. For example, the noun regiment denotes a collection of people, but it is an inanimate noun (V.p. = I.p.: I see a regiment - there is a regiment here). The same can be observed in the example of the noun microbe. From the point of view of biology, this is part of living nature, but the noun microbe is inanimate (V.p. = I.p.: I see a microbe - there is a microbe here). The nouns dead and corpse are synonymous, but the noun dead is animate (V.p. = R.p.: I see a dead man - there is no dead man), and the noun corpse is inanimate (V.p. = I.p.: I see a corpse - there is a corpse here).

Additionally:

It is known that the classification of nouns as animate or inanimate is associated with the division by man of the surrounding world into living and inanimate. However, even V.V. Vinogradov noted the “mythological nature” of the terms “animate/inanimate”, since textbook well-known examples ( plant, dead person, doll, people and etc . ) demonstrate the discrepancy between the objective status of an object and its comprehension in language. There is an opinion that by animate in grammar we mean “active” objects identified with a person, to which are contrasted “inactive” and, therefore, inanimate objects 1. At the same time, the “activity/inactivity” sign does not fully explain why the words dead man, deceased are considered animate, and people, crowd, flock – to inanimate nouns. Apparently, the category of animate/inanimate reflects everyday ideas about living and inanimate things, i.e. a person’s subjective assessment of the objects of reality, which does not always coincide with the scientific picture of the world.

Of course, the “standard” of a living being for a person has always been the person himself. Any language stores “petrified” metaphors, showing that people from ancient times saw the world as anthropomorphic, described it in their own image and likeness: the sun is out, the river is running, the leg of a chair, the spout of a teapot and so on . Let us recall at least the anthropomorphic gods or characters of lower mythology. At the same time, life forms other than humans: some invertebrates, microorganisms, etc. are often ambiguously assessed by ordinary native speakers. For example, as a survey of informants showed, to nouns sea ​​anemone, amoeba, ciliate, polyp, microbe, virus the question is regularly asked What? Obviously, in addition to signs of visible activity (movement, development, reproduction, etc.), the everyday concept of a living being (an “animate” object) also includes a sign of similarity to a person.

How is the animate/inanimate nature of a noun determined?

Traditionally, the coincidence of the forms of the accusative and genitive cases in the singular and plural of masculine nouns is considered as a grammatical indicator of animacy. (I see a man, a deer, friends, bears) and only in the plural for feminine and neuter nouns (I see women, animals). Accordingly, grammatical inanimateness is manifested in the coincidence of the accusative and nominative cases (I see a house, tables, streets, fields).

It should be noted that the grammatical opposition of nouns by animate/inanimate is expressed not only in the form of a specific case: the difference in the forms of nouns in the accusative case leads to a difference and opposition of paradigms in general. Masculine nouns have singular and plural paradigms on the basis of animate/inanimate, while feminine and neuter nouns have only plural paradigms, that is, each of the animate/inanimate categories has its own declension paradigm.

There is an opinion that the main means of expressing the animate/inanimate nature of a noun is the accusative case form of the agreed definition: “It is by the form of the agreed definition in the accusative case that the animate or inanimate nature of the noun in the linguistic sense of the word is determined” 2 . Obviously, this position requires clarification: the form of an adjective word should be considered as the main means of expressing animateness/inanimateness only in relation to the use of unchangeable words: I see beautiful cockatoo(V. = R.); I see beautiful coat(V. = I.). In other cases, the form of the adjectival word duplicates the meanings of case, number, gender and animate/inanimate nature of the main word - the noun.

The coincidence of case forms (V. = I. or V. = R.) in the declension of allied words of the adjectival structure (in a subordinate clause) can also serve as an indicator of animate/inanimate: These werebooks , which I knew(V. = I.); These were writers , which I knew(V. = R.).

Feminine and neuter nouns that appear only in the singular form (singularia tantum) do not have a grammatical indicator of animate/inanimate, since these words have an independent form of the accusative case that does not coincide with either the nominative or the genitive: catch swordfish, study cybernetics etc. Thus, the animate/inanimate nature of these nouns is not determined grammatically.

All nouns are divided into animate and inanimate.

Animate nouns- these are the names of people and animals: man, son, teacher, student, cat, squirrel, lion, starling, crow, perch, pike, insect.

Inanimate nouns- these are the names of all other objects and phenomena: table, book, window, wall, institute, nature, forest, steppe, depth, kindness, incident, movement, trip.

Note. Division of nouns into animate ones. and inanimate. does not fully reflect the division into living and nonliving that exists in the world. To animate nouns do not include, firstly, the names of trees and plants (pine, oak, linden, hawthorn, gooseberry, chamomile, bell), and secondly, the names of groups of living beings (people, army, battalion, crowd, herd, swarm). About words like virus, microbe, as well as corpse, dead man, doll, etc.

Animate nouns are morphologically and word-formatively different from inanimate nouns. Animate nouns - names of female persons or animals - are often motivated by a word that names a person or animal without indicating its gender or (less often) that names a male person or animal: teacher - teacher, student - student, schoolboy - schoolgirl, Muscovite - Muscovite, grandson - granddaughter.

Animate nouns usually have morphological meaning husband. or female R. and only a few - the meaning of environments. r., while the belonging of a noun to one gender or another (except for the middle r.) is determined semantically: nouns husband. R. call a person or animal male, and nouns female. R. - female. Animate nouns. R. are called living beings without regard to gender. This or the name of a non-adult creature ( child), or common names type face, creature, animal, insect, mammal, herbivore.

Inanimate nouns are divided into three morphological genders - masculine, feminine and neuter.

Paradigms of animate and inanimate nouns in plural. hours are consistently different: animate nouns in the plural. h. have the form of wines. n., coinciding with the form of the genus. P.; gender: no brothers and sisters, no animals; Vin.p.: saw brothers and sisters, saw animals. Inanimate nouns in plural. h. have the form of wines. n., coinciding with the form named after. P.; them. P.: peaches, pears and apples lie on the table; wine P.: bought peaches, pears and apples.

The belonging of words to the category of animate or inanimate reveals itself morphologically in the system of names, which in their lexical meanings combine concepts of living and nonliving. These are the following cases.

1) Nouns that name objects that either do not correspond to the everyday idea of ​​living things (names of microorganisms: virus, microbes, bacteria) or, conversely, are associatively identified with living objects ( dead man, deceased, doll), are used as follows: the former tend to be used as inanimate ( observe, study bacteria, viruses, microbes and observe, study bacteria, viruses, microbes; the latter is preferable), the latter are used as animate ( our nets brought in a dead man. Pushk.).

2) Inanimate nouns applied to specific persons or living beings acquire morphological signs of animation. These are negatively characterizing names of the type bag, oak, stump, cap, mattress usually with a defining pronominal adjective: our bag was deceived, you can’t push anything into this oak (stump), I saw this old cap, this mattress.

3) Words idol And idol in meaning (the one who is worshiped, who is adored) (when attributed to a specific person) appear as animate: look with delight at your idol, adore your idol. The word idol means (that which is worshiped, imitated; ideal) appears sometimes as animate, sometimes as inanimate: Making an idol out of this old, useless person (L. Tolstoy); there is no need to make an idol out of spelling (gas); but: How Desdemona chooses an Idol for her heart (Pushk.). Noun idol in meaning (statue, sculpture, which is worshiped as a deity) is rarely used as an animate: On the banks of the Danube, the Russians placed a wooden idol of Perun (A.N. Tolstoy).

Words blockhead, idol, graven image, used abusively towards a person, have morphological characteristics animation: I don’t want to see this idiot; And who gave birth to such an idol! (Sholokh.).

4) Words spirit(disembodied supernatural being), genius, type when applied to a face they act as animate: summon a spirit, know a genius, meet a strange type; I give him German geniuses as an example (Pushk); This is not the time to call out the shadows (Tutch.)(word shadow used in the meaning of “spirit, ghost”).

5) Words calling animate objects, when used to denote inanimate objects, they can retain morphological signs of animation. This includes: a) words reconnaissance aircraft, fighter, bomber, janitor(device for mechanical wiping of sight glass): shoot down an enemy reconnaissance aircraft, bomber, install a janitor; b) names of some dances and songs: Cossack, Kamarinsky(sub.): At your wedding I will dance a Cossack(S.-C.); c) names of cars by brand, company: "Moskvich", "Tiger", "Zaporozhets"". All these words can have both forms of vin. p. equal to them. p., i.e. classify the named objects as inanimate, and forms of vin. p. equal to gender p., i.e. classify so-called objects are classified as animate.

6) Words used in some games, in particular cards and chess; queen, jack, king, knight, bishop declined as animate nouns: open jack, king; take an elephant, a knight. Following the pattern of declension of such names as jack and king, they change ace And trump: discard an ace; open trump card.

In the Russian language there is a concept of animation. To put it figuratively, from the point of view of the Russian language, some objects are more alive than others. This state of affairs may seem strange, but let's try to figure it out and first consider the term. If you are already familiar with word formation in Russian, you can easily find the root beautiful word"animacy". Root -soul-. Similar words: soul, soulful.

The soul is life. Animate nouns denote those objects in which there is life, pulse, breath. For example. A person, a child, a cat, a bird are biologically living objects, therefore, they are animate. Student, musician, librarian, politician (although many argue with this fact) are also animate nouns. Dolphin, bear, parrot - animate.
Table, coffee, trees, city, brick are inanimate nouns.

For animate nouns we ask the question “who?” (who? to whom? by whom?)

- I heard the door slam. Who is this?
- Mom came.

For inanimate nouns we ask the question “what?” (what? what? what?)

Knowledge about the animate and inanimate nature of nouns helps to understand the cases of the Russian language. To determine case, we usually put questions to nouns.

Nominative case - who? What? - boy, book
A boy rides a bicycle, a book lies on the table.

Genitive case - whom? what? - boy, books
The boy is not at home, no one cares about the book.

Dative- to whom? what? - boy, book
The boy is not interested in reading, and the book must be very boring.

Accusative - whom? What? - boy, book
The bright cover attracted the boy, he drew attention to the book.

Creative - by whom? how? - boy, book
This had never happened to the boy before - he was completely captivated by the book.

Prepositional - about whom? about what? - about a boy, about a book
In the story about a boy and a book, many recognize themselves as children.

As you can see, the difference between the genitive and accusative cases, which are often confused, is immediately visible.

The main thing worth remembering about the concept of animacy is that in living speech, animateness and inanimateness approximately coincide with the concepts of living and inanimate.

Looking at a bird sitting on a branch, we say:
- Who is this?
- This is a finch.

Or about a fish that swims in the river:
- Who is this?
- This is trout.

At the same time, animals that have moved from the category of living beings to the category of, say, food, will become inanimate, and the same trout will no longer become “who”, but “what”:
- What kind of fish is in the refrigerator?
- This is trout.

There are not many exceptions when inanimate objects are considered animate. Here they are.

The nouns “dead” and “dead” (historically this is associated with the belief in an afterlife); however, their synonym noun "corpse" refers to inanimate;

Chess pieces: rook, queen, pawn and others; they “walk” and “beat”, the names of their actions can be correlated with the actions of living objects, so they also answer the question “who”;

The same goes for dolls and toys, since they imitate living, animate objects.

On this topic I would like to add something regarding grammar. For animate nouns, the accusative plural form coincides with the genitive plural form. And for inanimate nouns, this form, that is, the accusative plural form, coincides with the nominative case form. You can take any animate or inanimate nouns and practice the cases using the questions in the middle of this article.

Animate nouns include names of persons and animals: man, daughter, son, Vera, Petrov, Dima, duty officer, cow, goat, goose, starling, carp, spider etc. These are mainly masculine nouns and female. Neuter nouns are few in number: child, creature (in meaning “living organism”), face (meaning “person”), words in -ishche (monster, monster), substantivized adjectives and participles ( animal, insect, mammal). The ability of the “objects” they call to independently move and move, which inanimate objects do not possess, is often noted as a defining feature of animate nouns.

This semantic classification does not coincide with the scientific division of everything that exists in nature into living and nonliving: in the natural sciences, plants are also classified as living. It also does not fit into the framework of the “everyday” understanding of living and nonliving things. Thus, animate nouns include the words dead man, deceased, seemingly contrary to logic. Boiled duck and roast goose are also animate in grammar. This also includes a doll, a ball (in the language of billiard players), ace, trump, jack etc. - words that have nothing to do with the living world. The category of inanimate includes nouns that denote a collection of living beings ( people, crowd, platoon, flock, swarm, group etc.), as well as collective nouns type youth, peasantry, children, proletariat and others, denoting a collection of persons.

The division of nouns into animate and inanimate is built not only on semantic grounds, but also on
grammatical. Accusative plural
in animate nouns it coincides with the genitive, and
in inanimate - with the nominative. Wed:
I see trees, mountains, rivers, clouds, I see people, cows, birds,
flocks of insects, geese, I will buy cucumbers, notebooks, buttons, I will buy sheep, pigeons, dolls, I ate tangerines, oranges, ate chicken, crayfish, they served fried eggplants, they served fried partridges.

In the singular, the distinction between animate and inanimate nouns is consistently expressed morphologically in masculine words. Compare: inanimate nouns and animate nouns I’ll make soup, broth, I’ll cook a goose, a rooster, we’ll see off the steamer, we’ll see off a friend, plant potatoes, plant a guest.

The exception is masculine words ending in -a. In them, like in feminine nouns, the accusative case does not coincide with either the genitive or the nominative. Wed: I. - boy, girl; R. - boys, girls; IN. - boy, girl.

In animate nouns of the neuter gender, as in inanimate nouns, in the singular the form of the accusative case coincides with the form of the im. case. For example: Oh, how I love this empty creature! - Pavel Petrovich groaned(Turgenev). The same is observed for feminine nouns with zero ending in them case: I see a lynx, a mouse.

A deviation from the basic norm of expressing the meaning of animation is the formation of wine forms. pad. pl. h. with the preposition in nouns - names of persons expressing an attitude towards a certain social group: student, nanny, livestock breeder, etc. In constructions with the meaning “to become (do) who,” these words form the form of wines. case as inanimate nouns: promoted to general, elected to academician, joined as a janitor, joined the partisans, candidate for deputy and so on.

The names of microorganisms fluctuate between animate and inanimate nouns: microbe, bacillus, ciliates, bacterium, amoeba etc. They have two forms of the accusative case: study microbes and germs; examine viruses and viruses under a microscope; destroy bacilli and bacilli. IN professional language such words are usually used as animate nouns, and in the non-professional sphere as inanimate.

The same noun in one meaning can refer to animate things, and in another to inanimate ones. Thus, the names of fish in direct meanings are animate nouns ( catch crucian carp). When used as names of foods, they act as inanimate nouns: there are sprats, invite for trout etc. Wed. Also: I see a huge stump And I see this stump (who?) every day.

Animacy/inanimateness in words is manifested in a peculiar way dunce, idol, idol, graven image and others, which figuratively designate people. In the meaning of “statue” these words clearly gravitate toward inanimate ones, and in figurative meaning persons - to animate nouns. True, this feature is expressed inconsistently. Wed: set up an idol and it is difficult to convince this idol, But: On the banks of the Danube, the Russians placed a wooden idol (A.N. Tolstoy); From shaving his beard, he creates an idol for himself (Saltykov-Shedrin) and... makes an idol out of this old useless man (L. Tolstoy).

Titles works of art according to their heroes they act as animate nouns. Wed: get to know Eugene Onegin and listen to “Eugene Onegin”; call Rudin and read “Rudin” and so on.

Wed. Also: treated a Muscovite and bought a “Moskvich”, feed a horse and sculpt a horse, but feed a crocodile and buy a “Crocodile”; see a kite, fly a kite and make a kite.

Names ancient gods are animate nouns, and names of luminaries homonymous with them are inanimate: anger Mars and look at Mars, honor Jupiter and see Jupiter and etc.

The words type, image, character, which are the names of the characters in works of art, are used as inanimate nouns: create a strong character; characterize negative types and positive images. Wed: transfer characters novel, fairy tale characters, fable characters, But: bring out the comic character.