THE NOUN – CASE
(1.Nominative, 2.Objective or Accusative, 3.Possessive or Genitive, 4.Vocative or Nominative of Address, 5.Dative)
The Case of a noun can be classified into FIVE.
1. Nominative Case
Definition :
A noun or a pronoun, when it is used as the SUBJECT OF A VERB, it is said to be in the Nominative Case.
e.g.
| He bought a book |
In the given example ‘He’ is the subject. It is the answer to the question who bought the book? “Bought the book?” is the Predicate and it contains the Verb ‘Bought’. So the noun ‘He’ is said to be in the Nominative Case.
e.g.
| Jems was a Singer | Proper Noun |
| Stars shine at night | Common Noun |
| Platinum is very precious | Material Noun |
| The army advanced | Collective Noun |
2. Objective or Accusative Case
Definition :
A noun or a pronoun, when it is used as the OBJECT OF A VERB, it is said to be in the OBJECTIVE CASE.
e.g.
| John killed a dog. |
In the given example ‘A dog’ is teh answer to the question ‘What did John kill’? Therefore the noun ‘dog’ is called the OBJECT and it is said in the Objective Case.
e.g.
| Jems broke the door | Common Noun |
| He saw teh crowd | Collective Noun |
| We went to London | Proper Noun |
| Dhoni sold all his Gold | Material Noun |
3. Prossessive or Genitive Case
Definition :
A noun or a pronoun, when it is used to show owenership or possession, authority, origin, kind etc.,
It is said to be in the Possessive or Genitive Case.
e.g.
| This is John’s bike. |
When the noun is Singular, the Possessive Case is formed by adding ‘S’ (apostrophe S) to the noun and when it is ‘S’ ending Plural by adding an apostrophe after the ‘S’ (S’)
e.g.
| Singular | Possessive | Plural | Possessive |
|---|---|---|---|
| Boy | Boy’s | Boys | Boys’ |
| Book | Book’s | Books | Books’ |
| Girl | Girl’s | Girls | Girls’ |
| Man | Man’s | Men | Men’s |
| Our | Ours | Women | Women’s |
| My | Mine | Parents | Parents’ Day |
| You | Yours | ||
| 80 | 80s’ | ||
| 2009 | 2009’s | ||
| It | Its | ||
| Who | Whose |
4. Vocative Case or Nominative Case
Definition :
When the noun is the name of a person SPOKEN TO or ADDRESSED, it is said to be in the Vocative case or we call its case, the Nominative of address
| Sit down, Peter |
Dative Case
Definition :
When a noun indicates the indirect object of the verb – generally, ‘GIVE’ it is said to be in the Dative Case.
| David gave Mirza a pen |
In the above sentence David was the person to whom Mirza gave a pen. The Indirect object of a verb denotes the person to whome something is given or for whom something is done.
| Mirza bought Sachin a letter. | Get Sachin an umbrella. |