{"id":386,"date":"2009-12-15T08:48:19","date_gmt":"2009-12-15T16:48:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.abacus-es.com\/journal\/?page_id=386"},"modified":"2009-12-15T08:48:19","modified_gmt":"2009-12-15T16:48:19","slug":"three-most-common-errors-count-nouns-and-non-countable-mass-nouns","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/www.abacus-es.com\/journal\/learning-english\/editing-english-for-publication-a-guide-for-educated-asian-language-speakers\/three-most-common-errors-count-nouns-and-non-countable-mass-nouns\/","title":{"rendered":"Three most common errors: count nouns and non-countable (mass) nouns"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2>Count Nouns and Non-Countable (Mass) Nouns<\/h2>\n<p style=\"margin-bottom: 0in;\">In English, nouns that can be counted (count nouns) and those that cannot be counted (mass nouns) are handled very differently. In many cases count nouns and mass nouns are easily distinguished my simply asking whether making the noun plural and putting \u00e2\u20ac\u0153how many\u00e2\u20ac\u009d, a definite article, or a number in front of it makes more sense than \u00e2\u20ac\u0153how much\u00e2\u20ac\u009d:<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-bottom: 0in;\">Count nouns :<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>A pencil: three pencils<\/li>\n<li>A frog: three frogs<\/li>\n<li>A minister: three ministers.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"margin-bottom: 0in;\">Mass nouns are uncomfortable with numbers:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>A confusion: three confusions (No.  \u00e2\u20ac\u0153How much confusion\u00e2\u20ac\u009d)<\/li>\n<li>An air: three airs  (No,  \u00e2\u20ac\u0153How much air\u00e2\u20ac\u009d)<\/li>\n<li>A misery: three miseries (No,  \u00e2\u20ac\u0153How much misery\u00e2\u20ac\u009d)<\/li>\n<li>A research: three researches (No, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153How much research\u00e2\u20ac\u009d)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"margin-bottom: 0in;\">Many nouns can be both count and mass nouns, often with different meanings.<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-bottom: 0in;\">Paper:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>How much paper?  (boxes, rolls or reams of paper)<\/li>\n<li>How many papers?  (He published three papers last year)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Oil:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>How much oil?  (one quart)<\/li>\n<li>How many oils? (olive oil, corn oil, linseed oil \u00e2\u20ac\u201d  three oils.)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Mystery:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Much mystery surrounds the case of the giant rat of Sumatra.<\/li>\n<li>Many mysteries were set in English country houses.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"margin-bottom: 0in;\">Remember, mass nouns do not take indefinite articles and are quantified by \u00e2\u20ac\u0153how much\u00e2\u20ac\u009d. When in doubt, just compare the results count from a search for \u00e2\u20ac\u0153much [noun]\u00e2\u20ac\u009d to that from a search for \u00e2\u20ac\u0153many [noun]s\u00e2\u20ac\u009d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Count Nouns and Non-Countable (Mass) Nouns In English, nouns that can be counted (count nouns) and those that cannot be counted (mass nouns) are handled very differently. In many cases count nouns and mass nouns are easily distinguished my simply asking whether making the noun plural and putting \u00e2\u20ac\u0153how many\u00e2\u20ac\u009d, a definite article, or a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":258,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-386","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.abacus-es.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/386","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.abacus-es.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.abacus-es.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.abacus-es.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.abacus-es.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=386"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.abacus-es.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/386\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":387,"href":"http:\/\/www.abacus-es.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/386\/revisions\/387"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.abacus-es.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/258"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.abacus-es.com\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=386"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}