Nouns, an important element of parts of speech, play a crucial role in sentence structure and communication. They serve as the building blocks of sentences and help convey meaning by functioning as the subject, object, or complement. In this blog, “The Role of Nouns: Subject, Object, and Complements” I’m going to explain role of nouns in english grammar.
The role of nouns as subject of sentence
Let’s first explore the role of nouns as subjects. The subject is the main actor or doer of the action in a sentence. For example, in the sentence ‘Mary is reading a book,’ the noun ‘Mary’ is the subject. It is the one performing the action of reading.
The role of nouns as object in sentence
Nouns can also function as objects in a sentence. An object is the receiver of the action. Using the previous example, ‘a book’ is the object because it is being read by Mary. Objects can be direct objects, indirect objects, or objects of prepositions.
The role of nouns as complement in sentence
Complements are another important role of nouns. They provide additional information about the subject or object. There are two types of complements: subject complements and object complements.
Subject complements follow linking verbs and describe or rename the subject. For instance, in the sentence ‘He is a doctor,’ ‘doctor’ is the subject complement because it describes what the subject ‘he’ is.
On the other hand, object complements follow certain verbs and provide more information about the object. In the sentence ‘She painted the wall blue,’ ‘blue’ is the object complement because it describes the color of the object ‘wall.’
Nouns as subject, object and complements
Here are a few examples to illustrate the various roles of nouns:
- Subject: John runs every morning.
- Direct Object: She bought a new car.
- Indirect Object: He gave Mary a gift.
- Object of Preposition: I saw a bird in the sky.
- Subject Complement: She is a teacher.
- Object Complement: We elected him class president.
Subject in the sentence plays role of actor or doer to do, perform, actions as per the context or situation in demand. But, in case of complement, it is used to rename or describe itself.
Examples of nouns as subject
- Alex draws a picture daily. (Alex – proper noun and subject is doer and performing action to draw a picture.)
- Water carries a lot of sand and mud in rainy season. (Water – material noun and subject is actor of action carry.)
- Dogs are faithful pets. (Dog – common noun and subject is renamed as faithful pet.)
- Thomas gave me a football last night. (Thomas — proper noun and subject is performing action to affect two objects.)
- The leopard is on the mango tree. (The leopard – common noun and subject of location on the mango tree.)
Role of nouns as objects
There are two types of objects. One is direct and other indirect. It is also called dative case of noun. In such structure, we use two affected nouns.
Once again let’s take above third example, “A football”, is direct object of verb gave and” Me” is indirect object.
Selectors offered him a chance again. (Him – indirect object while “A chance” is direct object of verb offered.
Nouns used as complements
Sometimes, nouns are used describe themselves in the form of subject or object complements.
Mike is a smart student. (A smart student is description of” Mike “.) Here, student is complement of Mike – subject.
Secondly, in the above example, ” The leopard is on the mango tree ” Mango tree is complement of preposition “On”.
Nouns are the backbone of sentence structure, enabling us to convey our thoughts effectively. Understanding their roles as subjects, objects, and complements is essential for clear and concise communication in the English language.Properties and types of noun/Step by step guide to learn sentence formation
Role and usages of complements
Describing functions of Preposition,
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