Noun & its Classifications (Part -2) - English Grammar - English Grammar Basic - Class 10

Noun: Case

Cases in nouns tell about the position and role of a noun in a sentence. 

There are four kinds of cases:

1. Nominative
2. Accusative
3. Possessive 
4. Dative

Let us discuss these cases in detail. Each noun case is made bold. 

Nominative Case

If a noun or a pronoun is used as the subject, it is called nominative use.

For example,

She is reading.
       ↓
Nominative
Mohan is walking
      ↓
Nominative

Accusative Case

If a noun or pronoun is used as the object, called accusative use.

Possessive Case

For example,
Rahul's book.
     ↓
possession
Sharukh's brother.
     ↓
relation

Rules to write possessive cases.

1. At the end of a singular noun we put —'s for possessive case :
For example,
Rajiv's book, Meena's mother, President's bodyguard.

2. —s ending plural nouns take only (’)
For example
Boys' hostel, Girls' school
But,
Women's college, Men's competition, Children's park

3. In compound nouns, we use possessive with the last term.
For example,
Commander-in-chief's order
Mother-in-law's house
Father-in-law's problem
Engineer-in-chiefs' office
Brother-in-law's wife.

4. If possessive is used before than, it should be used after than.
For example,
Ravi's sister is more beautiful than Karan. —wrong
Ravi's sister is more beautiful than Karan's. —correct.
Kareena's husband is more handsome than Karishma.  — wrong
Kareena's husband is more handsome than Karishma's.  — correct
Rohan's brother is more intelligent than Mohan. —wrong
Rohan's brother is more intelligent than Mohan's. —correct

Dative Case

A noun is said to be in a dative case if it is the Indirect object of the verb. (Indirect object of the verb is the noun for whom or for which the action of the verb is carried out). There should not be a preposition before the indirect object because in that case, it will be the object of that preposition.

The postman brought me a letter.
   ↓
Dative