Do you know what a proper noun is? This article will provide you with all of the information you need on proper nouns, including the definition, usage, example sentences, and more!
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Kevin
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January 3, 2022
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What is a proper noun?
According to Collins English Dictionary and Your Dictionary, a proper noun is the name of a specific person, place or thing. Proper nouns begin with a capital letter. While the beginning of sentences begin with a capital, this does not always mean that the class of words is a proper noun. Sometimes these words would begin with lowercase letters if they were in the middle of a sentence. Examples of common nouns are things that are non specific, that would not be capitalized words. The biggest difference is that proper nouns are specific, like the specific name of a person. English proper nouns are a tricky group of words in grammar, but you will be an expert in no time. A generic name or nicknames would be common nouns.
Some things that are proper nouns are the names of people or the name of a particular person, names of pets, geographic locations, names of places, months of the year, days of the week, holidays, astronomical names, planets, publications such as newspapers, magazines or journals, books, companies, nonprofit organizations, schools, religions, faiths, cities, states, countries, place names, specific titles, course names, historical periods, historical events, languages, nationalities, brand names, and more. Some common nouns that are thought to be proper nouns but are not are seasons, general subjects or courses, celestial and lunar terms, and general titles.
Many different languages also contain words that mean proper noun. You may notice that some of these translations of proper noun look and sound similar to one another. These are called cognates, which are words and phrases in different languages that likely have the same root or language of origin, causing them to sound the same. The below list of translations of proper noun is provided by Word Sense.
- Arabic: اِسْم عَلَم
- Portuguese: substantivo próprio (masc.), nome próprio (masc.)
- Latin: nōmen proprium (neut.)
- Italian: nome proprio
- Icelandic: eiginnafn (neut.)
- Norman: nom propre (masc.)
- Persian: اسم خاص
- Czech: vlastní jméno (neut.)
- French: nom propre
- Bokmål: egennavn (neut.)
- Romanian: nume propriu (neut.), substantiv propriu (neut.)
- Hungarian: tulajdonnév
- Polish: nazwa własna (fem.)
- Danish: proprium, egennavn
- Russian: и́мя со́бственное (neut.)
- Scottish Gaelic: ainmear sònrachaidh (masc.)
- Swedish: egennamn
- Occitan: nom pròpri (masc.)
- Bashkir: яңғыҙлыҡ исем (yaŋğïðlïq isem)
- Hindi: नामवाचक संज्ञा (masc.)
- Catalan: nom propi
- Armenian: հատուկ անուն
- German: Eigenname (masc.)
- Albanian: emër i përveçëm
- Dutch: eigennaam (masc.)
- Georgian: საკუთარი სახელი, საკუთარი არსებითი სახელი
- Korean: 고유명사 (固有名詞)
- Greek: κύριο όνομα (neut.)
- Nynorsk: eigennamn (neut.)
- Amharic: የተፀውኦ ስም (yätäTS’äwao sm)
- Welsh: enw priod (masc.)
- Faroese: sernavn (neut.)
- Slovene: lastno ime (neut.)
- Turkish: özel ad, özel isim
- Finnish: erisnimi, propri
- Macedonian: лична именка
- Japanese: 固有名詞
- Kalmyk: эврә нерн
- Slovak: vlastné meno (neut.)
- Mandarin: 專有名詞, 专有名词 (zhuānyǒu míngcí), 固有名詞, 固有名词 (gùyǒu míngcí)
- Esperanto: propra nomo
- Telugu: సంజ్ఞానామము, సంజ్ఞావిశేష్యము
- Luxembourgish: Eegennumm (masc.)
- Latvian: īpašvārds (masc.)
- Cyrillic: властита именица
- Galician: nome propio (masc.)
- Spanish: nombre propio
- Old English: āgen nama (masc.)
- Thai: วิสามานยนาม
- Udmurt: асним
- Khmer: អសាធារណនាម (ak sathea raknak neam), នាមអសាធារណ៍ (neam ak sathea)
- Latin: vlastita imenica (fem.)
- Asturian: nome propiu (masc.)
- Interlingua: nomine proprie
What are examples of proper nouns?
A proper noun can be used in many different contexts in the English language. Trying to use a word or literary technique in a sentence is one of the best ways to memorize what it is, but you can also try making flashcards or quizzes that test your knowledge. Try using this term of the day in a sentence today! Below are a couple of examples of proper nouns that can help get you started incorporating this tool into your everyday use. Try to use the term proper noun today or notice when someone else is using a proper noun. Examples of common nouns include baseball, kids, picca, basement, cookies, new restaurant, short temper, mom, dirt, exams, distinctive features, semester, unreasonable demands, or other such words that are single words.
- New York
- Monday
- United Kingdom
- London
- United States of America
- Jupiter
- Bronx
- Pittsburgh
- Lincoln
- Iceland
- January
- Oreo
- France
- Europe
- Patrick
- England
- Gloria
- Harry Potter
- Jennifer
- Emily Dickinson
- Grand Canyon
- Mickey Mouse
- Great Depression
- Coca-Cola
- Uranus
- Eiffel Tower
- Leonardo da Vinci
- Colorado River
- Mars
- Beth
What are other literary techniques and devices?
There are many different literary and grammatical techniques and devices that you might see when you are reading prose or poetry. It is important to recognize these terms because they are always used for some purpose. Knowing these devices can help readers understand the author’s deeper meaning and why they are using such a device. Take a look at the below list of grammatical devices from OED and see how many you know! Then try researching ones that are unfamiliar to you.
- present participle
- concrete
- transitive
- anaphoric
- sentence adverb |sentence adverbial
- that-clause
- objective
- noun (n.)
- superlative
- genitive
- modal verb | modal auxiliary verb | modal auxiliary
- quasi-
- verbal noun
- subjunctive
- masculine
- absolute (absol.)
- possessive adjective
- adjective
- feminine
- interjection
- personal pronoun
- head
- intensifier
- main verb
- indirect speech
- person
- imperative (imper.)
- prepositional phrase
- special use
- number
- nominal relative | nominal relative clause
- past participle
- postmodify | postmodifier
- copular verb | copula
- appositive
- accusative
- past tense
- abstract
- pronoun (pron.)
- subject
- instrumental
- indirect question
- main clause
- common noun
- part of speech
- object | direct object | indirect object
- non-finite
- phrase (phr.)
- suffix
- direct speech
- dative
- combination
- simple
- apodosis and protasis
- possessive pronoun
- inflection | inflected | inflectional
- locative
- determiner
- subjective
- count noun
- similative
- conjunction (conj.)
- participial adjective
- declarative
- comparative
- periphrasis | periphrastic
- prepositional passive
- pro-form
- indirect passive
- adverb (adv.)
- adverbial | adverbially
- first person
- parenthetical | parenthetically
- collocation | collocate
- infinitive
- zero
- indefinite
- indicative
- phrasal verb
- non-referential
- interrogative
- base form
- anticipatory
- tense
- progressive
- compound | compounding
- singular
- modify | modifier
- predicative
- unmarked genitive
- intransitive
- definite article
- cataphoric
- gender
- apposition
- mass noun
- morpheme
- element
- construction
- conditional
- combining form (comb. form)
- direct question
- cognate object
- noun phrase
- relative
- positive
- clause
- agent noun
- passive
- vocative
- prefix
- passive infinitive
- verb (v.)
- to-infinitive
- antecedent
- reflexive
- auxiliary verb | auxiliary
- subordinate clause
- present tense
- second person
- case
- third-person
- plural
- protasis
- preposition (prep.)
- indirect object
- agree | agreement
- proper noun | proper name
- complementary
- ellipsis | elliptical
- parasynthetic
- participle | past participle | present participle
- direct object
- possessive
- collective noun
- stem
- bare infinitive
- causative
- construed (const., constr.)
- finite
- suffix
- prepositional object
- article
- optative
- double object
- pleonasm | pleonastic
- complement
- dual
- mood
- demonstrative
- premodify | premodifier
- perfect
- neuter
- impersonal (impers.)
- attributive
- nominative
- active
- filler
Overall, the word proper noun refers to a specific person, place or thing.
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