Nouns in Groups

• 

• Save to Delicious

• Save to StumbleUpon

• Subscribe to the Blog

There are three main ways in which we can put nouns together so that one modifies the other:

1. noun + noun:
a bicycle factory
a war film
the table leg.

2. noun + ’s + noun:
my sister’s car
a bird’s nest
cow’s milk.

3. noun + preposition + noun:
the top of the page
a man from London
a book on modern music
a feeling of disappointment.

Unfortunately, the exact differences between the three structures are complicated and difficult to analyse – this is one of the most difficult areas of English grammar. We use the noun + ’s + noun structure to talk about parts of people’s and animals’ bodies, (e.g. an elephant’s trunk) but to talk about parts of non-living things we usually use noun + noun structure (e.g. the table leg; NOT the table’s leg.)

With words like top, bottom, front, back, side, inside, outside, beginning, middle, end, part we usually prefer the noun + preposition + noun structure:

the top of the page (not: the page top)
the back of the bus (not: the bus back)
the bottom of the glass (not: the glass bottom)
the end of the film (not: the film end)

There are, however, some common exceptions:

the water’s edge
the seaside
the roadside
a mountain top.

We also prefer the noun + preposition + noun structure with words that refer to units, selections and collections, like piece, slice, lump, bunch, blade, pack, herd, flock, group, and so on (e.g. a piece of paper; a bunch of flowers).

Related Posts

Would you like to keep up to date?

If you like this post then please consider subscribing to our full feed RSS. You can also subscribe by Email and have new posts sent directly to your inbox or follow me on twitter for real time updates. There is a mobile version of the blog as well.

Do you love this post? Share it, thanks!