Nouns of any kind (count or non-count, singular or plural) may be “specific” or “general.” A noun is specific when the writer wishes to talk about some thing or things in particular. A noun is general when the writer wishes to make a generalization about some thing or things.

Specific nouns refer to a particular member of a category; they point to a precise person or thing that can be identified. Non-specific nouns refer to a category or to an undefined member of a category; they point to a broader group of persons or things. If the noun is specific, use “the”.

particular instance

1. When the subject of a sentence is composed of two or more nouns or pronouns connected by and, use a plural verb. She and her friends are at the fair. 2.

The function of a phrase depends upon its construction and place in a sentence. Depending upon its function in a sentence, phrases are divided into various types: Noun Phrase, Verb Phrase, Adjective Phrase, Adverb Phrase, Gerund Phrase, Infinitive Phrase and Absolute Phrase.

Types of Phrases

• Noun Phrase. A noun phrase is any noun or pronoun along with its modifiers:
• Verb Phrase. A verb phrase is any number of verbs working together:
• Prepositional Phrase.
• Verbal Phrases.
• Participial Phrase.
• Gerund Phrase.
• Infinitive Phrase.
• Appositive Phrase.

A noun phrase may consist of only one word. That word will be either a noun or a pronoun.

A phrase can be as short as two words. Phrases combine to form clauses and sentences. (Clauses include subject-verb combinations, phrases don’t.)

A complete sentence, even a one-word sentence, needs to have a noun and a verb. In one-word sentences the subject (noun) or the action (verb) of the sentence is implied. Be careful though, sometimes you can sound robotic or rude if you use too many one-word sentences. Here is a list of some common one-word sentences.

The simplest definition of a noun is a thing and nouns are the basic building blocks of sentences. These things can represent a person, animal, place, idea, emotion – almost any thing that you can think of. Dog, Sam, love, phone, Chicago, courage and spaceship are all nouns.

A compound noun is a noun made by putting two or more words together to act as one noun. These nouns can be written as one word (as in fireworks and waistline), as hyphenated words (as in well-being), or as separate words (as in ice cream).

The words are used in very different ways: two is a number that can be used as a noun or an adjective, to is most commonly used as a preposition, and too is an adverb.

Eight common types of phrases are: noun, verb, gerund, infinitive, appositive, participial, prepositional, and absolute….Here are examples:

• He was waiting for the rain to stop.
• She was upset when it didn’t boil.
• You have been sleeping for a long time.
• You might enjoy a massage.
• He was eager to eat dinner.

phrase is a group of words that work together to make meaning, but it is not a complete sentence. In other words, it does not have both a subject and a verb. Example of phrases put together in a sentence: The brown hat was blowing away in the wind.

In English grammar, a phrase is a group of two or more words functioning as a meaningful unit within a sentence or clause. A phrase is commonly characterized as a grammatical unit at a level between a word and a clause.