¡Descarga Understanding Uncountable Nouns in English: Substances, Feelings, Activities, and Abstract y más Apuntes en PDF de Periodismo solo en Docsity! Nouns - uncount nouns Some nouns in English are uncount nouns. We do not use uncount nouns in the plural and we do not use them with the indefinite article, a/an. We ate a lot of foods > We ate a lot of food We bought some new furnitures > We bought some new furniture That’s a useful information > That’s useful information We can use some quantifiers with uncount nouns: He gave me some useful advice. They gave us a lot of information. Uncount nouns often refer to: • Substances: food; water; wine; salt; bread; iron • Human feelings or qualities: anger; cruelty; happiness; honesty; pride; • Activities: help; sleep; travel; work • Abstract ideas: beauty; death; fun; life Common uncount nouns There are some common nouns in English, like accommodation, which are uncount nouns even though they have plurals in other languages: advice baggage equipment furniture homework information knowledge luggage machinery money news traffic Let me give you some advice. How much luggage have you got? If we want to make these things countable, we use expressions like: a piece of... pieces of... a bit of... bits of... an item of... items of... Let me give you a piece of advice. That’s a useful piece of equipment. We bought a few bits of furniture for the new apartment. She had six separate items of luggage. but we do not use accommodation, money and traffic in this way. Complete the sentences with a word from the box. ADVICE, KNOWLEDGE, EQUIPMENT, TRAFFIC, LUGGAGE, MONEY, INFORMATION, HOMEWORK, NEWS, FURNITURE 1. I'm sorry I'm late. I got stuck in …………….. . 2. I like camping, but you have to take a lot of …………… . 3. For further ………………. please contact your local council. 4. He didn't make much …………….., but he liked the job. 5. The room looks empty; there are only a few pieces of ..…………… . 6. If you want my …………………, I'd sell it as soon as possible. 7. That's the best ……………….. I've heard for ages! 8. You can't go outside until your …………………. is finished. 9. I'm afraid your ……………….. is over the 20kg limit. 10. Her ……………….. in this area is very impressive. • The government is very unpopular. The government are always changing their minds. Sometimes we think of the group as a single thing: • The audience always enjoys the show. • The group consists of two men and three women. Sometimes we think of the group as several individuals; • The audience clapped their hands. • The largest group are the boys. The names of many organisations and teams are also group nouns, but they are usually plural in spoken English: • Barcelona are winning 2-0. • The United Oil Company are putting prices up by 12%. 6: Two-part nouns A few plural nouns, like binoculars, refer to things that have two parts. glasses jeans knickers pincers pants pliers pyjamas scissors shorts spectacles tights trainers trousers tweezers These binoculars were very expensive Those trousers are too long. To make it clear we are talking about one of these items, we use a pair of … I need a new pair of spectacles. I’ve bought a pair of blue jeans. If we want to talk about more than one, we use pairs of … : We’ve got three pairs of scissors, but they are all blunt. I always carry two pairs of binoculars. 1: Uncount nouns used as count nouns Although substances are usually uncount nouns... Would you like some cheese? Coffee keeps me awake at night. Wine makes me sleep. ... they can be also used as count nouns: I’d like a coffee please. I’d like a [cup of] coffee. May I have a white wine. May I have a [glass of] white wine. They sell a lot of coffees. They sell a lot of [different kinds of] coffee. I prefer white wines to red. I prefer [different kinds of] white wine to red. They had over twenty cheeses on sale. They had over twenty [types of] cheese on sale. This is an excellent soft cheese. This [kind of] soft cheese is excellent. 2: Some nouns have both a count and an uncount form: We should always have hope. George had hopes of promotion. Travel is a great teacher. Where did you go on your travels? 3: Nouns with two meanings Some nouns have two meanings, one count and the other non count: His life was in danger. There is a serious danger of fire. Linguistics is the study of language. Is English a difficult language? It’s made of paper. The Times is an excellent paper. Other words like this are: business death industry marriage power property tax time victory use work 4: Uncount nouns that end in -s Some uncount nouns end in -s so they look like plurals even though they are singular nouns. These nouns generally refer to: Subjects of study: mathematics, physics, economics, etc. Activities: gymnastics, athletics, etc. Games: cards, darts, billiards, etc. Diseases: mumps, measles, rabies, etc. Economics is a very difficult subject. Billiards is easier than pool or snooker. 5: Group nouns Some nouns, like army, refer to groups of people, animals or things, and we can use them either as singular nouns or as plural nouns. army audience committee company crew enemy family flock gang government group herd media public regiment staff team
