Proper Noun

Definition

Proper noun can be defined as “A name used for an individual person, place, or organization, spelled with an initial capital letter”.

Explanation

Proper noun is the noun used to name individual person, place or any organization. It is written with its first letter in capital and does not matter the place of its occurrence in the sentence.

Means, it is always written with its first letter in capital whether comes in the starting, middle or end of the sentence. In order to know the proper use of proper noun in the sentence, you need to know the difference between proper noun and common noun as many of us generally get confused between both.

How to Differentiate Between Proper Noun and Common Noun

Differentiating both is very clear however you need make a clear image of both in your mind in order to be sure forever. Proper noun is used to name a person, place or organization in the sentence such as Mohan, Marry, India, Germany, Kodak, Microsoft, etc.

It is necessary to write proper nouns in the sentence with capital letter. Whereas, common noun is used to name general items instead of specific ones and written with small letter if occurs in the middle or end of the sentence and capital letter if occur in the start of sentence.

We have provided below a table having very nice examples of both which will help you in understanding the difference.

Common Nouns	Proper Nouns
restaurant	Madan Sweet, Domino’s, McDonald’s, KFC’s, etc
cookie	Parle-G
writer	Ravindranath Tagore
man, boy	Mohan
school	Delhi Public School
teacher	Dr. Sarvapalli Radha Krisnan
city	Delhi
girl, woman	Radha
country	US
state	UP
company	Microsoft, Maruti, Toyota, Ford, TCS, etc
shop	Mohan’s, Sohan’s, etc
mountain	Everest
movie	Kahani, Titanic, PK, etc
day	Monday, Tuesday, etc
month	January, February, March, etc
book	A Tale Of Two Cities, The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, etc
bank	ICICI, HDFC, SBI, etc
river	Ganga, Yamuna, Triveni, etc

Rules to be Followed

There are some rules which help you in using proper nouns in the sentence without any confusion between common and proper noun.

1) Proper nouns are always written with capital letter occur anywhere in the sentence. Proper nouns are names of people, places, months, days, companies, restaurants, hotels, sports, games, industries, brands, etc. Generally, there is no any exception to this rule, however somewhere in the advertisements proper nouns may start with small letter to give them a modern look. But, it is grammatical error to start proper nouns with small letter, so you should be very clear in the exams.

For example:

• I like Mohan very much.
• I live in India from my birth.
• She failed to get job in Microsoft
• I went Agra
• I saw Titanic movie first time in cinema hall.
• My final exams will start on Monday.
• We will go abroad in January.
• I have a son named Varchasva and a daughter named Varishtha.
• I read in Chhabil Das Junior Public School.
• I got gold medal for Badminton.
• I love to see Cricket
• I like Doraemon cartoon very much.

2) Some proper nouns are written without the use of ‘THE’, such as we never use ‘the’ with the names of people, companies, years, languages, .

For example:

• Narendra Modi is the prime minister of India.
• Rajani Tyagi is my class teacher.
• My Principal name is Ravi Singh.
• Albert Einstein was a physicist.
• Mahatma Gandhi is known as Bapu.
• I bought a sports car from Renault.
• I bought a camera of Sony
• I was born in 1982.
• I know Hindi very well.
• I can easily talk in English.

* In some cases, the full name of companies are written with ‘the’. In this case, ‘the’ becomes the part of company’s name and written with capital letter.

* In some cases, we use ‘the’ before the name of a country if it’s name includes “States”, “Kingdom”, or “Republic”.

For Example:

the United States, the USA, the US, the United States of America, the UK, the United Kingdom, the Republic of Ireland, the Republic of India, the French Republic, the Republic of China, etc.

3) Some proper nouns are written with the use of ‘THE’, such as we use ‘the’ for names of canals, seas, rivers, oceans, countries that have plural names, famous buildings, museums, or monuments, newspaper names, decades, clauses introduced by only, unique people or objects, etc.

For example:

• I was traveling in the Arctic with my friends.
• My ship crossed the Atlantic in 8 days.
• I went to the Vietnam Memorial last year.
• I saw the Eiffel Tower in scenery only.
• This is the only day I become happy.
• Today I saw the CEO of my company in a meeting.
• My mother is the only person I generally listen to.
• I was born in the 90’s.
• I like movies of the 70’s.
• I read this news in the Times of India.
• My elder brother works for the New York Times.
• The sun sets daily at 7 pm in summer.
• The sky has been covered by clouds.
• It’s very difficult to hike across the Rocky Mountains.
• I saw complete speech of the president on teacher’s day.
• One of the cricketers belongs to the Philippines.
• The Statue of Liberty is located in New York.

Use of It in the Sentence

It is easy to use proper nouns in the sentences once you have thorough knowledge of the rules described above. You need to be sure that you have capitalized them.

For example:

• Me and my friends like very much to eat cookies especially Oreo. (”cookies” is common noun, ”Oreo” is proper noun)
• The name of my class teacher is Anita Agrawal. (”teacher” is common noun, ”Mrs. Anita Agrawal” is proper noun)
• The name of restaurant where we enjoyed a lot is Madan Sweet. (”restaurant” is common noun, ”Madan Sweet” is proper noun)
• Agatha Christie is a famous writer who wrote many books. (”writer” is common noun, ”Agatha Christie” is proper noun)
• Rosy is my cutest cat I adopted last year. (”cat” is common noun, ”Rosy” is proper noun)
• We went to San Francisco city last year. (”city” is common noun, ”San Francisco” is proper noun)
• Swami is my good teacher who finishes work before alarm. (”teacher” is common noun, ”Mr. Swami” is proper noun)
• Jupiter is a planet and not a star. (”planet or star” is common noun, ”Jupiter” is proper noun)
• The Library of Congress contains lots of important documents. (”documents” is common noun, ”The Library of Congress” is proper noun)

Exercises for You

Proper noun exercise will help you in analyzing your knowledge about proper noun. Just go through all the details about proper noun provided above and check your skill by doing the exercises for proper noun. We have used proper nouns in following sentences, you need to check your skill by identifying proper noun in each sentence:

1. He hits his dog, Wilson through the ball.
2. I meet her friend Merry yesterday.
3. We will go London in this summer vacation.
4. Rajni Tyagi was a good teacher in the second standard.
5. My dad has bought a very nice dining table from Smith’s Furniture.
6. Dolphin looks very beautiful swimming in the sea.
7. We went India through Emirate Airlines last year.
8. Thomas Fernandis is a good writer and philosopher.
9. My best friend went London to complete his further study.
10. Three boats were sailing in the Ganga river.
11. I met Sonam at the post office.
12. Vivan is my best classmate.
13. India got independence in 1947 from British rule.
14. Millions of people use English as their second language.
15. My one of classmates belongs to Nagpur.
16. Delhi is the capital city of our country.
17. Earth is the only known planet having life.
18. Do you know the capital city of Australia?
19. We went water park at last Sunday.
20. My friend Vairag went to Lucknow for a year.
21. I like to have bath in the Ganga river.
22. My younger brother is working in Microsoft company.
23. Mansi drink cow milk daily.
24. I only eat Oreo cookies.
25. Jawaharlal Nehru was the first prime minister of our country.
26. Indira Gandhi was the first woman prime minister of our country.
27. I like Pineapple very much.
28. Banana is very nutritious fruit.
29. I study in Delhi Public School.
30. My mom gives me proteinaceous diet everyday.

Answers: 1 – Wilson, 2 – Merry, 3 – London, 4 – Mrs. Rajni Tyagi, 5 – Smith’s Furniture, 6 – Dolphins, 7 – Emirate Airlines, 8 – Thomas Fernandis, 9 – London, 10 – Ganga, 11 – Sonam, 12 – Vivan, 13 – India, 14 – English, 15 – Nagpur, 16 – Delhi, 17 – Earth, 18 – Australia, 19 – Sunday, 20 – Vairag, 21 – Ganga, 22 – Microsoft, 23 – Mansi, 24 – Oreo, 25 – Jawaharlal Nehru, 26 – Indira Gandhi, 27 – Pineapple, 28 – Banana, 29 – Delhi Public School, 30 – Nothing.

Related Topics:

Noun
Common Noun
Compound Noun
Countable Noun
Uncountable Noun
Collective Noun
Possessive Noun
Concrete Noun
Abstract Noun
Singular Noun
Plural Noun