An abstract noun is a type of noun. A noun names a person, thing, or place.
Abstract nouns are the opposite of concrete nouns. You will better understand nouns with definitions and examples of abstract nouns.
Read about abstract nouns.
- Abstract nouns refer to objects we cannot experience with our five senses.
- These nouns don’t have any physical existence.
- Abstract nouns can identify ideas, concepts, experiences, qualities, and feelings.
Definition of Abstract Noun
Finding the abstract noun in a sentence is effortless.
Here is the definition of the abstract noun.
- An abstract noun is a noun that shows an idea, event, state, action, quality or concept.
- An abstract noun shows something we can’t physically touch, feel, hear, taste, smell, or see.
This means abstract nouns exist only in our minds and cannot be sensed through our senses. They include ideas, states of being, qualities, relationships, conditions, theories, and fields of inquiry.
We cannot touch a quality such as regularity in work directly with our hands; we can only see or hear about the worker who works regularly, and we come to know his regularity.
Examples of Abstract Nouns
We can understand better with examples.
The following sentences include examples of abstract nouns.
Here are some examples of abstract nouns shown in bold letters.
- In childhood, we used to climb trees.
- She cracked a joke, and laughter broke out.
- Metal gets hardness after a chemical reaction.
In the above sentences, the words ‘childhood’, ‘laughter’, and ‘hardness’ show the state, action and quality.
- The names of sciences and arts are also abstract nouns.
Ex-Physics, Biology
Concrete Nouns
A concrete noun is the opposite of an abstract noun.
It means-
- A concrete noun represents something that we can hear, smell, taste, see and touch.
Examples of Concrete Nouns
Here are some examples of concrete nouns in bold letters.
- The book is on the table.
- Keep that bag
- There is a big tree in front of his house.
- A lion is a forest animal.
- A cloud is white in colour.
In the sentences above, the words ‘book’, ‘table’, ‘bag’, ’tree’, ‘house’, ‘lion’, ‘forest’, ‘animal’, and ‘cloud’ are concrete nouns.
This makes it easy to differentiate between abstract nouns and concrete nouns.
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