The 8 parts of speech

1 Nouns

A noun is a word that names person, place, concept, or object. Basically, anything that names a
“thing” is a noun, whether you’re talking about a basketball court, San Francisco, Cleopatra, or
self-preservation. 

Nouns fall into two categories: common nouns and proper nouns. Common nouns are general
names for things, like planet and game show. Proper nouns are specific names for individual
things, like Jupiter and Jeopardy!

2 Pronouns

Pronouns are the words you substitute for specific nouns when the reader or listener knows
which specific noun you’re referring to. 

You might say “Jennifer was supposed to be here at eight,” then follow it with “she’s always
late; next time I’ll tell her to be here a half-hour earlier.” 

Instead of saying Jennifer’s name three times in a row, you substituted she and her and your
sentences remained grammatically correct. Pronouns are divided into a range of categories, and
we cover them all in our guide to pronouns: 

3 Adjectives

Adjectives are the words that describe nouns. Think about your favourite movie. How would you
describe it to a friend who’s never seen it?

You might say the movie was funny, engaging, well-written, or suspenseful. When you’re
describing the movie with these words, you’re using adjectives. An adjective can go right before
the noun it’s describing (I have a black dog), but it doesn’t have to. Sometimes, adjectives are at
the end of a sentence (my dog is black).

4 Verbs

Go! Be amazing! Run as fast as you can! Win the race! Congratulate every participant who put
in the work and competed!

These bolded words are verbs. Verbs are words that describe specific actions, like running,
winning, and being amazing. 

Not all verbs refer to literal actions, though. Verbs that refer to feelings or states of being, like to
love and to be, are known as nonaction verbs. Conversely, the verbs that do refer to literal
actions are known as action verbs.
5 Adverbs

An adverb is a word that describes an adjective, a verb, or another adverb. Take a look at these
examples:

Here’s an example: I entered the room quietly. Quietly is describing how you entered (verb) the
room.

Here’s another example: A cheetah is always faster than a lion. Always is describing how
frequently a cheetah is faster (adjective) than a lion.

6 Prepositions

Prepositions tell you the relationship between the other words in a sentence. 

Here’s an example: I left my bike leaning against the garage. In this sentence, against is the
preposition because it tells us where I left my bike. 

Here’s another example: She put the pizza in the oven. Without the preposition in, we don’t
know where the pizza is. 

7 Conjunctions

Conjunctions make it possible to build complex sentences that express multiple ideas. 

I like marinara sauce. I like alfredo sauce. I don’t like puttanesca sauce. Each of these three
sentences expresses a clear idea. There’s nothing wrong with listing your preferences like this,
but it’s not the most efficient way to do it. 

Consider instead: I like marinara sauce and alfredo sauce, but I don’t like puttanesca sauce. 

In this sentence, and and but are the two conjunctions that link your ideas together. 

8 Articles

A pear. The brick house. An exciting experience. These bolded words are known as articles. 

Like nouns, articles come in two flavors: definite articles and indefinite articles. And just like the
two types of nouns, the type of article you use depends on how specific you need to be about the
thing you’re discussing. 

A definite article describes one specific noun, like the and this. Example: Did you buy the car?

Now swap in an indefinite article: Did you buy a car?

See how the implication is gone and you’re asking a much more general question?
Figuring out parts of speech
Sometimes, it’s not easy to tell which part of speech a word is. Here are a few easy “hacks” to
quickly figure out what part of speech you’re dealing with: 

 If it’s an adjective plus the ending “-ly,” it’s an adverb. Examples: commonly, quickly.
 If you can swap it out for a noun and the sentence still makes sense, it’s a pronoun.
Example: We played basketball. / Steve and I played basketball. 
 If it’s something you do, and you can modify the sentence to include the word do, it’s a
verb. Examples: I have an umbrella. / I do have an umbrella. 
 If you can remove the word and the sentence still makes sense, but you lose a detail, the
word is most likely an adjective. Example: She drives a red van. / She drives a van. 
 If you can remove the word and the sentence doesn’t make sense, it’s likely a preposition.
Example: I left my notebook on the desk. / I left my notebook the desk.

And if you’re ever really stumped, just look the word up. Dictionaries typically list the part of
speech a word fits in its entry, and if it fits more than one part of speech, both are listed with
examples.

That brings us to another common issue that can confuse writers and language learners:

When a word is two different kinds of speech

Just like y is sometimes a vowel but sometimes a consonant, there are words that are sometimes
one part of speech and other times another. Here are a few examples:

 Work 
o I went to work (noun). 
o I work in the garden (verb).
 Well
o She paints very well (adverb).
o He’s well-liked in his community (adjective).
o I dropped a penny in the well (noun).
 But
o I cooked breakfast and lunch, but Steve cooked dinner (conjunction).
o I brought everything but the pens you asked for (preposition).

And sometimes, words evolve to fit into new parts of speech. One recent example is the word
“adult.” Before the 2010s, adult was primarily a noun that referred to a fully grown person. It
could also be used as an adjective to refer to specific types of media, like adult contemporary
music. But then, at right about the turn of the 2010s, the word adulting, a brand-new verb,
appeared in the internet lexicon. As a verb, adulting is the act of doing tasks like paying bills
and grocery shopping. 
Open and closed word classes
The parts of speech fall into two-word classes: open and closed. 

Open word classes are parts of speech that regularly acquire new words. Language evolves, and
usually, evolution happens in these parts of speech: nouns, adjectives, adverbs, and verbs. In
2020, new words added to the Merriam-Webster dictionary included deepfake, truthiness, and
contactless. 

Closed word classes are the parts of speech that don’t regularly add new words. These parts of
speech are more “set in stone” and include pronouns, conjunctions, articles, and prepositions. 
What is a noun?
A noun is a word that names something, such as a person, place, thing, or idea. In a sentence,
nouns can play the role of subject or adjective.

Types of nouns
Nouns form a large proportion of English vocabulary and they come in a wide variety of types.
Nouns can name a person:

Albert Einstein

the president

my mother

a girl

Nouns can also name a place:

Mount Vesuvius

Disneyland

my bedroom

Nouns can also name things, although sometimes they might be intangible things, such as
concepts, activities, or processes. Some might even be hypothetical or imaginary things.

shoe

faucet

freedom

The Elder Wand

basketball

Proper nouns vs. common nouns

One important distinction to be made is whether a noun is a proper noun or a common noun. A
proper noun is a specific name of a person, place, or thing, and is always capitalized.

Does Tina have much homework to do this evening?

Tina is the name of a specific person.

I would like to visit Old Faithful.

Old Faithful is the specific name of a geological phenomenon.

The opposite of a proper noun is a common noun, sometimes known as a generic noun. A
common noun is the generic name of an item in a class or group and is not capitalized unless
appearing at the beginning of a sentence or in a title.

The girl crossed the river.

Girl is a common noun; we do not learn the identity of the girl by reading this sentence, though
we know the action she takes. River is also a common noun in this sentence.

Types of common nouns

Common or generic nouns can be broken down into three subtypes: concrete nouns, abstract
nouns, and collective nouns. A concrete noun is something that is perceived by the senses;
something that is physical or real.

I heard the doorbell.

My keyboard is sticky.

Doorbell and keyboard are real things that can be sensed.

Conversely, an abstract noun is something that cannot be perceived by the senses.

We can’t imagine the courage it took to do that.

Courage is an abstract noun. Courage can’t be seen, heard, or sensed in any other way, but we
know it exists.

A collective noun denotes a group or collection of people or things.

That pack of lies is disgraceful.

Pack of lies as used here is a collective noun. Collective nouns take a singular verb as if they are
one entity – in this case, the singular verb is.

A pride of lions roamed the savanna.

Pride of lions is also a collective noun.

Nouns as subjects

Every sentence must have a subject, and that subject will always be a noun. The subject of a
sentence is the person, place, or thing that is doing or being the verb in that sentence.

Maria is happy.

Maria is the subject of this sentence and the corresponding verb is a form of to be (is).

Nouns as objects

Nouns can also be objects of a verb in a sentence. An object can be either a direct object (a noun
that receives the action performed by the subject) or an indirect object (a noun that is the
recipient of a direct object).

Give the books to her.

Books is a direct object (what is being given) and her is the indirect object (who the books are
being given to).

Nouns as subject and object complements

Another type of noun use is called a subject complement. In this example, the noun teacher is
used as a subject complement.

Mary is a teacher.

Subject complements normally follow linking verbs like to be, become, or seem. A teacher is
what Mary is.

A related usage of nouns is called an object complement.

I now pronounce you husband and wife.

Husband and wife are nouns used as object complements in this sentence. Verbs that denote
making, naming, or creating are often followed by object complements.

Appositive nouns and nouns as modifiers

An appositive noun is a noun that immediately follows another noun in order to further define or
identify it.

My brother, Michael, is six years old.

Michael is an appositive here, further identifying the subject of the sentence, my brother.
Sometimes, nouns can be used adjectivally as well.

He is a speed demon.

Speed is a normally a noun, but here it is acting as an adjective to modify demon.

Plural nouns
Plural nouns, unlike collective nouns, require plural verbs. Many English plural nouns can be
formed by adding -s or -es to the singular form, although there are many exceptions.

cat—cats

These two cats are both black.

Note the plural verb are.

tax—taxes

house—houses

Countable nouns vs. uncountable nouns

Countable nouns are nouns which can be counted, even if the number might be extraordinarily
high (like counting all the people in the world). Countable nouns can be used with a/an, the,
some, any, a few, and many.

Here is a cat.

Cat is singular and—obviously—countable.

Here are a few cats.

Here are some cats.

Uncountable nouns, or mass nouns,  are nouns that come in a state or quantity which is
impossible to count; liquids are uncountable, as are things that act like liquids (sand, air). They
are always considered to be singular, and can be used with some, any, a little, and much.

An I.Q. test measures intelligence.

Intelligence is an uncountable noun.

Students don’t seem to have much homework these days.

This example refers to an unspecified, unquantifiable amount of homework, so homework is an
uncountable noun.

Possessive nouns
Possessive nouns are nouns which possess something; i.e., they have something. You can
identify a possessive noun by the apostrophe; most nouns show the possessive with an
apostrophe and an s.

The cat’s toy was missing.

The cat possesses the toy, and we denote this by use of ’s at the end of cat.

When a singular noun ends in the letter s or z, the same format often applies. This is a matter of
style, however, and some style guides suggest leaving off the extra s.

I have been invited to the boss’s house for dinner.

Mrs. Sanchez’s coat is still hanging on the back of her chair.

Plural nouns ending in s take only an apostrophe to form a possessive.

My nieces’ prom dresses w

ere exquisite.

Nouns FAQs
What are nouns?

Nouns refer to a person, place, thing, or idea. They make up the subjects, direct objects, and
indirect objects in a sentence, along with other roles. 

What are examples of nouns?

Nouns can be living things (Keanu Reeves or cat), places (beach or Detroit), things (ruler or
PlayStation 5), or ideas (nihilism or the theory of evolution). 

What are the different types of nouns?

Common nouns refer to general things (like parks), and proper nouns refer to a specific thing
(like Yellowstone National Park). Nouns can also be plural or singular, depending on how many
there are, and countable or uncountable, depending on how their plural form is used. 

How do you identify a noun in a sentence?

Nouns usually have articles (the, a, or an) before them in a sentence, but not always. Sometimes
you’ll see adjectives or words like “some” or “this” before nouns. Aside from the first word in a
sentence, if a word is capitalized then it’s a noun, such as a person’s name. 

Your writing, at its best.

VERBS

Want to know where all the action is? Verbs! Verbs are words that represent actions that are
external (run, jump, work) and internal (love, think, consider). Without verbs, you can’t do
anything, you can’t feel anything—you can’t even be anything.  

As the heart of sentences and clauses, verbs show what the subject is doing or feeling, even if
they’re just existing. Verbs are also the only type of word that’s absolutely necessary to make a
sentence. Not even nouns, which represent things, need to be in every sentence. 

Want to know where all the action is? Verbs! Verbs are words that represent actions that are
external (run, jump, work) and internal (love, think, consider). Without verbs, you can’t do
anything, you can’t feel anything—you can’t even be anything.  

As the heart of sentences and clauses, verbs show what the subject is doing or feeling, even if
they’re just existing. Verbs are also the only type of word that’s absolutely necessary to make a
sentence. Not even nouns, which represent things, need to be in every sentence.