Noun clauses in English grammar are subordinate clauses that consist of a subordinating conjunction followed by a clause. Noun clauses perform nominal grammatical functions.

Noun clause is a grammatical form.

The nine grammatical functions performed by noun clauses are subject, subject complement, direct object, object complement, indirect object, prepositional complement, adjective phrase complement, noun phrase complement, and appositive.

The subordinating conjunctions in English that introduce noun clauses are that, Ø, if, whether, wh- words, and wh-ever words.

Noun clauses may be either finite or nonfinite. Finite noun clauses contain conjugated verbs functioning as predicates. Nonfinite noun clauses contain unconjugated verbs functioning as predicates.

Noun clauses may be formed from declarative or interrogative sentences.

References

DeCarrico, Jeanette S. 2000. The structure of English: Studies in form and function for language teaching. Ann Arbor, MI: The University of Michigan Press.
Hopper, Paul J. 1999. A short course in grammar. New York: W. W. Norton & Company.
Huddleston, Rodney. 1984. Introduction to the grammar of English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

In traditional treatments of grammar, nouns are defined as words that denote a person, place, thing, or idea. A noun phrase is a phrase that consists of a noun functioning as the head of the phrase plus any modifiers, complements, or determiners. A pronoun is a word that stands in for a noun or noun phrase. Pronouns are a subcategory of nouns.

In grammar, a determinative is a noun or noun phrase plus the possessive clitic (apostrophe s or s apostrophe) that indicates possession of or some other relationship to another noun or noun phrase. Nouns and noun phrases frequently function as determinatives in the English language. Proper nouns especially perform the grammatical function of determinatives. Examples of nouns and noun phrases as determinatives include the following:

I love reading children’s literature. (noun)
Herman’s daughter is very delightful to talk to. (noun)
Robbers broke into someone’s car last night. (pronoun)
Who stole the cookie from the cookie jar is anybody’s guess. (pronoun)
The museum put the Queen of England’s crown on display. (noun phrase)
The man who lives next door’s dog is always bothering my cat. (noun phrase)

References

Brinton, Laurel J. & Donna M. Brinton. 2010. The linguistic structure of Modern English, 2nd edn. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company.
Hopper, Paul J. 1999. A short course in grammar. New York: W. W. Norton & Company.
Huddleston, Rodney. 1984. Introduction to the grammar of English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Most native English speakers can recall (with some trepidation) the days of fill-in-the-blank grammar exercises. Consider with me the following sentences:

• A good student always turns ___ homework in on time.
• One should always wash ___ hands before eating.
• Apparently someone called for you; ___ asked you to call ___ back.

According to the prescriptive grammars dictating the traditional English grammar classroom, the “correct” answers should be something along the lines of:

• A good student always turns his or her homework in on time.
• One should always wash one’s hands before eating.
• Apparently someone called for you; he/she asked you to call him/her back.

These answers (his or her, one’s, he/she, him/her) are all fine and well for a grammar homework assignment, but who really talks like that?

The Impersonal in English

Are you as an English speaker more likely to say “One should always wash one’s hands before eating” or “One should always wash their hands before eating”? Even I, the grammar nerd that I am, am more likely to use the possessive determiner their instead of the impersonal modifier one’s. With this statement, the prescriptive grammarian is likely to interject: “But their is plural! You can’t use a plural to refer back to a singular!”

Yes, I can, and, yes, I do. First, language is not about conforming to a set of arbitrarily prescribed rules. Instead, language is as language does. Language is how people use it, not how some uppity prescriptivists say it should be used. Native English speakers frequently use the plurals they, them, their, and theirs to refer back to singular antecedents. In fact, native English speakers more often use the plural their in constructions that have the impersonal pronoun one as the subject than to use the impersonal modifier one’s.

Secondly, the third person plural personal pronouns and possessive determiners are used in the construction of the impersonal in English. The impersonal is used in English to make general statements without a specified agent. An agent, in the case of the impersonal, is defined as the persons who perform the action of the verb. Although the impersonal pronouns in English are officially the one pronouns (one, someone, no one, anyone), the third person plural pronoun they as well as the second person pronoun you and the noun people can also be used in the construction of the impersonal in English. Such impersonal markers can also be mixed and matched as in the case of mixing one with their in the example One should always wash their hands before eating.

The Lack of the Gender Neutral Singular in English

The first and third sentences illustrate the problem of the lack gender neutral singular pronouns and possessive determiners in English. Both antecedents a good student and someone indicate the referent is a singular individual of unknown gender. A good student can be male or female as could the person who made the phone call in discussion. In either case, the noun phrase to which the subsequent pronouns and possessive determiners refer is singular.

In English, the singular pronouns are he/him/his, she/her/hers, and it/it/its and the singular possessive determiners his, her, and its. Unlike the nouns in languages like German and Spanish which show grammatical gender, nouns including pronouns in English reflect natural gender. While grammatical gender is the assignment of nouns to categories such as masculine, feminine, and neuter, natural gender is the reflection of the biological sex or social gender of the referents of nouns. For example, the noun man is considered masculine because men are male.

Prescriptive grammars only allow for the expression of three natural genders in the singular personal pronouns and possessive determiners. He, him, his, and his are masculine and refer to males. She, her, hers, and her are feminine and refer to females. It, it, its, and its are neuter and refer to non-sexed referents. However, none of these pronouns allow for the expression of an unknown gender.

The Development of the Singular They

The simplest solution to the lack of a gender neutral third person singular pronoun and possessive determiner would seem to be to make one up. For example, some English speakers interested in the topic have suggested the creation of the pronoun e as a gender neutral third person pronoun. However, pronouns belong to a closed word class, meaning new pronouns cannot easily be created and current pronouns cannot easily be changed or deleted. Instead, through the process known as semantic change, English speakers have adopted the word they and its inflected forms as a third person singular gender neutral pronoun and possessive determiner.

Returning to our three fill-in-the-blank sentences, should one always wash one’s hands or should one always wash their hands before eating? The answer is either, depending on the context of the statement. Only the most formal registers such as in academic writing still prohibit the use of the singular they. One is perfectly grammatical in washing their hands of the proscription of the singular they.

References

Glencoe literature: The reader’s choice: Course 4. 2000. New York: Glencoe McGraw-Hill.
Glencoe writer’s choice grammar and composition: Grade 9. 2005. New York: Glencoe McGraw-Hill.
Language Network Grade 9. 2001. Boston: McDougal Littell.

Noun phrase complements in English grammar are words, phrases, and clauses that complete the meaning of a noun or noun phrase.

Noun phrase complement is a grammatical function.

The grammatical form that can function as the noun phrase complement in English grammar is the noun clause.

Noun phrase complements are constituents of the noun phrase.

References

Brinton, Laurel J. & Donna M. Brinton. 2010. The linguistic structure of Modern English, 2nd edn. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company.
Hopper, Paul J. 1999. A short course in grammar. New York: W. W. Norton & Company.
Huddleston, Rodney. 1984. Introduction to the grammar of English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Noun phrase modifiers in English grammar are words, phrases, and clauses that modify or describe a noun including a pronoun or a noun phrase.

Noun phrase modifier is a grammatical function.

The grammatical forms that can function as the noun phrase modifier in English grammar are noun phrase, adjective phrase, prepositional phrase, verb phrase, and adjective clause.

Noun phrase modifiers are constituents of the noun phrase.

References

Brinton, Laurel J. & Donna M. Brinton. 2010. The linguistic structure of Modern English, 2nd edn. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company.
Hopper, Paul J. 1999. A short course in grammar. New York: W. W. Norton & Company.
Huddleston, Rodney. 1984. Introduction to the grammar of English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Nouns are traditionally defined as words that refer to a person, place, thing, or idea. A noun phrase is a phrase that consists of a noun plus any modifiers, complements, or determiners. A subcategory of nouns, pronouns are words that take the place of nouns and noun phrases.

In grammar, an indirect object is word, phrase, or clause that indicates to or for whom or what the action of a ditransitive verb is performed. Nouns, pronouns, and noun phrases most frequently function as indirect objects in English. Examples of nouns including pronouns and noun phrases as indirect objects include the following:

• That woman gives puppies baths. (noun)
• My uncle loves to read children stories. (noun)
• The committee mailed me a letter. (pronoun)
• Give someone a call tonight. (pronoun)
• I wished the man in the purple hat who likes squirrels a good evening. (noun phrase)
• We have offered somebody special a job. (noun phrase)

References

Brinton, Laurel J. & Donna M. Brinton. 2010. The linguistic structure of Modern English, 2nd edn. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company.
Hopper, Paul J. 1999. A short course in grammar. New York: W. W. Norton & Company.
Huddleston, Rodney. 1984. Introduction to the grammar of English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Noun phrases in English grammar are phrases in which a noun functions as the head of the phrase. A noun phrase consists of a noun including a pronoun plus any determiners, modifiers, and complements. Noun phrases perform nominal grammatical functions.

Noun phrase is a grammatical form.

The ten grammatical functions performed by noun phrases are subject, subject complement, direct object, object complement, indirect object, prepositional complement, noun phrase modifier, determinative, appositive, and adverbial.

The seven grammatical forms that may appear in noun phrases are determiners, adjective phrases, prepositional phrases, verb phrases, adjective clauses, noun clauses, and noun phrases.

References

Brinton, Laurel J. & Donna M. Brinton. 2010. The linguistic structure of Modern English, 2nd edn. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company.
Hopper, Paul J. 1999. A short course in grammar. New York: W. W. Norton & Company.
Huddleston, Rodney. 1984. Introduction to the grammar of English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Nouns have traditionally been defined as words for people, places, things, and ideas. A noun phrase consists of a noun plus any modifiers, complements, and determiners that provide more information about the noun. Pronouns, which are a subcategory of nouns, are words that take the place of nouns and noun phrases.

In grammar, direct object is a word, phrase, or clause that follows and receives the action of a mono-transitive verb. Nouns, pronouns, and noun phrases most frequently function as direct objects in English grammar. Examples of nouns including pronouns and noun phrases as direct objects include the following:

• My rabbit eats carrots. (noun)
• Some dogs despise men. (noun)
• The committee elected no one. (pronoun)
• She loves him. (pronoun)
• The hurricane destroyed the extremely tall building next to the ancient bowling alley. (noun phrase)
• That man likes women who bake pies and enjoy rock climbing. (noun phrase)

References

Brinton, Laurel J. & Donna M. Brinton. 2010. The linguistic structure of Modern English, 2nd edn. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company.
Hopper, Paul J. 1999. A short course in grammar. New York: W. W. Norton & Company.
Huddleston, Rodney. 1984. Introduction to the grammar of English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

In traditional grammar books, nouns have been defined as describing people, places, things, and ideas. Noun phrases consist of a noun and any modifiers, complements, and determiners that provide more information about the noun. A pronoun is word that takes the place of a noun or noun phrase. Pronouns are a subcategory of nouns.

In grammar, a subject complement is a word, phrase, or clause that follows a copular, or linking, verb and describes the subject of a clause. A noun that performs the grammatical function of subject complement is also called a predicate nominative or predicate noun. Examples of nouns including pronouns and noun phrases as subject complements include the following:

• My favorite animals are dogs. (noun)
• The boys became teachers. (noun)
• This is she. (pronoun)
• Her favorite aunt is me. (pronoun)
• His desire to coach the Bears seemed a very lofty goal. (noun phrase)
• That chocolate cake was the best thing I ever ate. (noun phrase)

References

Brinton, Laurel J. & Donna M. Brinton. 2010. The linguistic structure of Modern English, 2nd edn. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company.
Hopper, Paul J. 1999. A short course in grammar. New York: W. W. Norton & Company.
Huddleston, Rodney. 1984. Introduction to the grammar of English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

A noun is traditionally defined as a word that denotes a person, place, thing, or idea. A noun phrase is a phrase consisting of a noun and any modifiers, complements, or determiners. Pronouns are a subcategory of nouns which take the place of nouns and noun phrases.

In grammar, a subject is a word, phrase, or clause that performs the action of or acts upon the verb. In the English language, nouns, pronouns, and noun phrases most frequently function as subjects. Examples of nouns including pronouns and noun phrases as subjects include the following:

• Cats chase mice. (noun)
• Babies cry, eat, and sleep. (noun)
• I love my husband. (pronoun)
• No one is smarter. (pronoun)
• My puppy woke me up too early. (noun phrase)
• The exuberant woman with the pink hat sells seashells by the seashore. (noun phrase)

References

Brinton, Laurel J. & Donna M. Brinton. 2010. The linguistic structure of Modern English, 2nd edn. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company.
Hopper, Paul J. 1999. A short course in grammar. New York: W. W. Norton & Company.
Huddleston, Rodney. 1984. Introduction to the grammar of English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.