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Linguistics & Grammar vocabulary · Parts of Speech

Countable noun

Meaning in linguistics & grammar, with examples

nounCore term

In linguistics & grammar, countable noun means: A noun that has singular and plural forms and can be used with numbers and a/an, such as book, idea or student; uncountable nouns like water or advice cannot.

In Turkish: sayılabilir ad, sayılabilir isim

How it is used

Learner dictionaries mark nouns [C] for countable and [U] for uncountable. Countable nouns take many and few; uncountable ones take much and little. Many nouns are countable in one sense and uncountable in another (a coffee, some coffee).

Example sentences

  1. 'Suggestion' is a countable noun, but 'advice' is not: say 'some advice', not 'an advice'.

  2. Check the dictionary to see whether 'research' is a countable noun.

Common collocations

  • countable and uncountable nouns
  • count noun
  • mass noun
  • plural countable noun
  • nounA word that names a person, place, thing, idea or feeling and can usually be the subject or object of a verb, such as teacher, Ankara, chair or freedom.
  • articleOne of the words a, an and the, used before a noun to show whether it is general or specific, and whether it is new or already known to the listener.
  • determinerA word that comes before a noun to show which one or how much is meant, such as the, a, this, my, some, every or two.
  • noun phraseA group of words built around a noun or pronoun that works as one unit, often as subject or object, such as 'the tall man in the blue coat'.

More terms: Parts of Speech

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