Nouns
Nouns in Afrikaans have no inflectional case system, and do not have grammatical gender. However, there is a distinction between the singular and plural forms of nouns. The most common plural marker is the suffix -e, but several common nouns form their plural instead by adding a final -s. A number of common nouns have irregular plurals:
| English | Afrikaans | Dutch |
|---|---|---|
| child, children | kind, kinders | kind, kinderen |
| woman, women | vrou, vroue (vrouens) | vrouw, vrouwen |
| shirt, shirts | hemp, hemde | hemd, hemden |
No grammatical case distinction exists for nouns, adjectives and articles.
| Definite Article(s) | Indefinite Article | ||||
| Gloss | Afrikaans | Dutch | Gloss | Afrikaans | Dutch |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| the | die | de/het | a(n) | 'n | een/'n |
Read more about this topic: Afrikaans Grammar
Famous quotes containing the word nouns:
“Children and savages use only nouns or names of things, which they convert into verbs, and apply to analogous mental acts.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“All the facts of nature are nouns of the intellect, and make the grammar of the eternal language. Every word has a double, treble or centuple use and meaning.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)