What are compound nouns & material nouns with examples

In this lesson we are going to discuss compound nouns and material nouns. Before starting we have to know.

What is a noun?

Everything in the world has a name. All names or naming words are nouns. A noun means a person, place, animal or thing.

Lets understand noun using example:-

• Look at the wild cat.
  In the above sentence, cat is an animal.

• Ram is playing football.
  In the above sentence, we can see two nouns Ram and Football. Ram is the name of a person and Football is the name of a game.

• India is the most beautiful country in Asia.
• Cheetah is the fastest animal.
• Look at the train.

Types of Noun:-

Let’s discuss the classifications of nouns. Nouns are mainly divided into six parts.

1. Proper noun and common noun.
2. Collective noun.
3. Countable and uncountable nouns.
4. Compound Noun.
5. Material Noun.
6. Concrete and Abstract noun.

We already discussed about Abstract noun.

In this lesson we will discuss compound nouns & material nouns.

Compound Noun:-

Compound noun is a noun which is made with two or more words. Usually they are a combination of [NOUN] + [NOUN] OR [ADJECTIVE] + [NOUN].

Let’s see some examples of this combinations:-

 [NOUN] + [NOUN] –

1. Toothpaste
   Here tooth and paste both are nouns and they form a compound noun toothpaste.

1. Bedroom
   Here bed and room both are nouns and they form a compound noun bedroom.
2. Girlfriend
   Here girl and friend both are nouns and they form a compound noun girlfriend.
3. Motorcycle
   Here motor and cycle both are nouns and they form a compound noun motorcycle.
4. Water Bottle
   Here water and bottle both are nouns and they form a compound noun water bottle.

[ADJECTIVE] +  [NOUN] –

1. Monthly ticket
   Here, monthly is an adjective and ticket is a noun, and they form a compound noun monthly ticket.
2.  Software
   Here, soft is an adjective and ticket is a ware, and they form a compound noun software.
3. Greenhouse.
   Here, green is an adjective and ticket is a house, and they form a compound noun greenhouse.

Let’s see some more combination and their examples:-

[VERB] + [NOUN] –

• Washing machine
  Here, washing is a verb, and machine is a noun. And they both form a compound word washing machine.
• Swimming pool
  Here, Swimming is a verb, and pull is a noun. And they both form a compound word swimming pool.
• Driving license
  Here, driving is a verb, and license is a noun. And they both form a compound word driving license.

[PREPOSITION] + [NOUN] –

• underground
  Here, under is a preposition and ground is a noun, and they both form together underground.

[NOUN] + [VERB] –

• Haircut
  Here hair is a noun and cut is a verb and they both form together haircut.
• Rainfall
  Here rain is a noun and fall is a verb and they both form together rainfall.

There are three forms of compound noun:-

1. Open or spaced.
2. Hyphenated.
3. Closed or solid.

1. Open or spaced:-

There are spaces between words.

For Example:- Tennis shoe
Here, there is a space between the words Tennis and shoe.

• His tennis shoes are really expensive.

2. Hyphenated:-

Hyphenated means hyphen between the words.

For Example :- Mother-in-law
Here, there is a hyphen between the words mother, in and law.

• My mother-in-law lives with us.

3. Closed or solid:-

Closed means no space between the words.

For example:- Bedroom
Here, there is no space between the words bed and room.

• His bedroom’s interior is gorgeous.

Now let’s look into another category of noun,

Material Noun:-

Material nouns are names of materials or substances out of which things are made.We get this material mainly from three sources, nature, animal and plants. They are usually uncountable nouns.

Let’s look into example to make things clear:-

• Air

Where do we get it from?
We get it from nature.

• Gold

We get the raw material of gold from nature.

• Milk

We get it from animals like cows. Buffalo, goats.

• Juice

We get it from trees.

Now let’s see sentence example to make things clearer:-

• We run a steel company.
• Fogg is my favorite perfume.
• I like platinum ring.

Exercises :-

Find material & compound nouns from these sentences:-

1. Nowadays air pollution is a main cause of global warming.
2. Seema drinks apple juice everyday.
3. I need some water.
4. Pages are made from trees.
5. Riya forgot her driving license.
6. I made a treehouse in childhood.
7. Trisha booked her monthly ticket.

Answers:- 

1. air
2. juice
3. water
4. trees
5. driving license
6. treehouse
7. monthly ticket