Mass noun

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In linguistics, a mass noun (also uncountable noun or non-count noun) is a type of common noun that cannot be modified by a number without specifying a unit of measurement; thus mass nouns have singular but no plural forms. Count nouns, on the other hand, have plural forms, and can be modified by numerals and quantifiers like "one", "two", "every", "most", etc.

It is often erroneously thought that mass nouns are used only to represent substances not easily quantified by a number, such as water. Mass nouns like "furniture" and "cutlery", which represent easily quantified objects, show that the mass/count distinction should be thought of as a grammatical property of the expressions themselves, rather than as a property of the substances they represent. For example, the same set of chairs can be referred to as "seven chairs" and as "furniture". Thus it is the expressions, not the entities or substances that they refer to, which can be characterized as either "mass" or "count". The distinction between what words can (like "too much") or can't (like "a dozen") be used with mass nouns is solely a matter of what expressions a mass noun can grammatically co-occur with, not to the objects and substances which mass nouns may refer to.

Sometimes, however, a physical or abstract entity has a part-whole structure which makes it difficult to refer to with a count noun. Most things that can be referred to with a count noun can also be referred to with a mass noun, given the right context. Example:

"There is apple on the floor."

The work of logicians like Godehard Link and Manfred Krifka established that the mass/count distinction can be given a precise, mathematical definition in terms of quantization and cumulativity.

Some illustrative examples of English mass nouns:

water
sand
furniture
meat
knowledge
software
cattle
mathematics

Some nouns can have both mass noun and count noun forms and meanings. For example, "fire" as a mass noun generally refers to fire in general ("I hate fire"). As a count noun, however, "a fire" refers to a specific conflagration ("There's a fire upstairs" or possibly "There are fires upstairs", generally not "There's fire upstairs"), even if it's an especially large one, as in forest fires. In some situations, either a mass noun or a count noun can be used, with a count noun expressing more focused and specific fires, and a mass noun expressing a more vague "fire".

"I see fire." (mass)

"I see a fire." (count)

"There is fire everywhere!" (mass)

"There are fires everywhere!" (count)

The difference between mass and count can be more subtle when phrased in the negative, however.

"There is no fire in this area." (could be either)

"There is not fire in this area." (mass)

"There is not a fire in this area." (count)

"There are no fires in this area." (count)

Another difference between mass and count nouns is the distinction between the words much and many and between less and fewer.

"We have too much furniture." (mass)

"We have too many chairs." (count)

"We used to have less furniture." (mass)

"We used to have fewer chairs." (count)

However, many English speakers use less for both types; in recent years many supermarkets have been criticised for their signs above checkouts reading "10 items or less", as the proper grammatical form would be "10 items or fewer": "items" is a count noun, and a mass noun cannot be given a number in any case. In American English in particular, "less" is used more commonly than "fewer" to describe count nouns, although this usage is considered incorrect by prescriptivist grammarians. Additionally, in casual speech, a construction like "10 objects or less" isn't typically heard; "less than 10 objects" is far more common. Constructions such as "10 or less of the objects" are still pervasive, however. Regardless, even in American English, this usage is frowned upon, and is typically considered an idiosyncratic, rather than dialectical, variation.

A mass noun can be preceded by a measure word, as in "ten pieces of furniture" or "a gallon of water".

Note that the lack of a distinct plural form is not a sufficient criterion by itself to determine that a noun is a mass noun. For example, the singular and plural forms of the word "deer" are identical, but it is grammatically acceptable to say "three deer", "a deer", or "several deer". Therefore, "deer" is a count noun. Compare with "rice": not only is there no plural "rices", but "three rice", "a rice", and "several rice" all appear wrong to native English speakers. The noun "fish" further confuses the issue, as the plural of the animal "fish" can be "fishes" or "fish", while "fish" as a meat is a mass noun (see "salmon"/"shark" distinction below).

Some speakers of English use a plural form of non-count nouns when there are mixed types. For example, if one sees a school of fish, it is non-count because all of the fish in a school are identical. However, when one sees a variety of fishes in a net, they are of different species, and are called "fishes". According to this rule, two salmon are two fish, whereas one salmon and one shark together are two fishes.

The word data is often used as a mass noun, especially by people who work with computers. In formal writing it typically retains its original grammatical role as the plural of "datum", but treating it as a mass noun is becoming increasingly popular. Some other mass nouns have their origins as plural count nouns: spaghetti in Italian is the plural of spaghetto, but in English it has become firmly established as a mass noun, making both "I want five spaghetti" and "I want a spaghetti" grammatically incorrect.

There is also a tendency in colloquial American English to treat some mass nouns as countable, e.g. "behaviors" for "behavior" or "accommodations" for "accommodation". Some of these countable forms have slightly different meanings than their mass forms.

"Aquafina and Ozarka are two different brands of water." (mass)

"Aquafina and Ozarka are two different waters." (count)

This should not be confused with nouns that can genuinely be used as either mass or count nouns, such as the aforementioned "fire". Thus, the following are all correct:

"There are sands in the hourglass." (count)

"There is sand in the hourglass." (mass)

"There is a sand in the hourglass." (count)

Some kinds of nouns have subtle rules. For example, count forms are used for fish not intended for food, while mass nouns are used for fish that one would eat.

"The net is full of salmon." (mass)

"The net is full of sharks." (count — used if the speaker is not a shark eater)

"The net is full of shark." (mass — used if the speaker is a shark eater)

In some languages, such as Japanese, all nouns are effectively mass nouns and require a measure word to use.

External links

[The Mavens Word of the Day: less/fewer]

[Semantic Archives: Mass nouns, count nouns and non-count nouns]

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Mass noun

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