Nominalization
In linguistics, nominalization or nominalisation, also known as nouning, is the use of a word that is not a noun as a noun, or as the head of a noun phrase. This change in functional category can occur through morphological transformation, but it does not always. Nominalization can refer, for instance, to the of producing a noun from another part of speech by adding a derivational affix, but it can also refer to the complex noun that is formed as a result.
Some languages simply allow verbs to be used as nouns without inflectional difference, while others require some form of morphological transformation. English has cases of both.
Nominalization is a natural part of language, but some instances are more noticeable than others. Writing advice sometimes focuses on avoiding overuse of nominalization. Texts that contain a high level of nominalized words can be dense, but these nominalized forms can also be useful for fitting a larger volume of information into smaller sentences. Often, using an active verb is the most direct option.
In various languages
English nominalization
Two types of nominalization occur in English. The first requires the addition of a derivational suffix to a word to create a noun. In other cases, English uses the same word as a noun without any additional morphology. This second process is referred to as zero-derivation.Derivational morphology and nominalization
Derivational morphology is a process by which a grammatical expression is turned into a noun phrase. For example, in the sentence "Combine the two chemicals," combine acts as a verb. This can be turned into a noun via the addition of the suffix -ation, as in "The experiment involved the combination of the two chemicals." There are many suffixes that can be used to create nouns. Huddleston provides a thorough list that is split into two main sections: person/instrument nominalizations and action/state/process nominalizations. An especially common case of verbs being used as nouns is the addition of the suffix -ing, known in English as a gerund.| Nominalization type | Derived nominals | Formation | Sentence examples |
| Nominalized adjective |
| applicable + -ibility | The applicability of the law in this case is debatable. |
| intense + -ity | The intensity of her gaze frightened the dog. | ||
| happy + -ness | Her happiness was a result of having her loving friends. | ||
| Nominalized verb | react + -ion | The children's reactions to receiving candy were priceless. | |
| refuse + -al | The board's refusal to consider the motion ended the meeting. | ||
| adjust + -ment | Starting University is a big adjustment. | ||
| Gerundive nominalization | write + -ing | Writing is a difficult skill to learn in a new language. | |
| run + -ing | Running is a cardio-heavy exercise. | ||
| cut + -ing | Cutting the grass is fun. |
Zero-derivation nominalization
Some verbs and adjectives in English can be used directly as nouns without the addition of a derivational suffix, depending on the syntax of a sentence. Zero-derivation nominalization is also called conversion.| Token | Lexical category | Usage |
| change | verb | I will change. |
| change | noun | I need a change. |
| murder | verb | He will murder the man. |
| murder | noun | The murder of the man was tragic. |
Stress- and pronunciation-dependent nominalization
In addition to true zero-derivation, English also has a number of words which, depending on changes in pronunciation, can change functional category to either act as a noun or a verb. One such type, which is rather pervasive, is the change in stress placement from the final syllable of the word to the first syllable.| Example: increase | Lexical category | Usage |
| noun | Profits have shown a large increase. | |
| verb | Profits will continue to increase. |
An additional case is seen with the verb use, which has a different pronunciation when used as a noun. The nominal case of use has a word final voiceless alveolar fricative /s/, while the verbal case of use has a word final voiced alveolar fricative, /z/. Which of two sounds is pronounced is a signal, in addition to the syntactic structure and semantics, as to the lexical category of the word use in the context of the sentence.
| Example: use | Lexical category | Usage |
| noun | The use of forks is dangerous. | |
| verb | Use your fork! |
In some circumstances, adjectives can also have nominal use, as in the poor to mean poor people in general. See nominalized adjective.
Other Indo-European languages
Many Indo-European languages have separate inflectional morphology for nouns, verbs, and adjectives, but often this is no impediment to nominalization, as the root or stem of the adjective is readily stripped of its adjectival inflections and bedecked with nominal inflections—sometimes even with dedicated nominalizing suffixes. For example, Latin has a number of nominalization suffixes, and some of these suffixes have been borrowed into English, either directly or through Romance languages. Other examples can be seen in German—such as the subtle inflectional differences between deutsch and Deutsch across genders, numbers, and cases—although which lexical category came first may be moot. Spanish and Portuguese, whose o/os/a/as inflections commonly mark both adjectives and nouns, shows a very permeable boundary as many roots straddle the lexical categories of adjective and noun.Chinese
In all varieties of Chinese, particles are used to nominalize verbs and adjectives. In Mandarin, the most common is 的 de, which is attached to both verbs and adjectives. For example, 吃 chī becomes 吃的 chīde. Cantonese uses 嘅 ge in the same capacity, while Minnan uses ê.Two other particles, found throughout the Chinese varieties, are used to explicitly indicate the nominalized noun as being either the agent or patient of the verb being nominalized. 所 is attached before the verb to indicate patient, e.g. 吃 becomes 所吃, and 者 is attached after the verb to indicate agent, e.g. 吃 becomes 吃者. Both particles date from Classical Chinese and retain limited productivity in modern Chinese varieties.
There are also many words with zero-derivation. For instance, 教育 jiàoyù is both a verb and a noun. Other cases include 变化 biànhuà, 保护 bǎohù, 恐惧 kǒngjù, etc.
Vietnamese
In Vietnamese, nominalization is often implicit with zero derivation, but in formal contexts or where there is a potential for ambiguity, a word can be nominalized by prepending a classifier., and are the most general classifiers used to nominalize verbs and adjectives, respectively. Other nominalizing classifiers include , , , , .Tibeto-Burman
Nominalization is a pervasive process across Tibeto-Burman languages. In Bodic languages nominalization serves a variety of functions, including the formation of complement clauses and relative clauses.Japanese
makes frequent use of nominalization via several particles such as の no, もの mono and こと koto. In Old Japanese, nouns were created by replacing the final vowel, such as mura created from muru, though this type of noun formation is obsolete.Dual nature of syntactic nominalization
Syntactic nominals share some properties with lexically-derived nominals, they must be formed in the syntactic components, consisting of verbal projections. The duality of nominalization in Japanese grammar brings up the issue of whether or not VP should be postulated for the projection of arguments inside the nominal.Nominal and verbal properties in Japanese
Causative, passive, and honorific verb marking inside kata-nominals provide evidence that a vP structure should be postulated.-kata 'way' suffixed to the "renyookei" form of a verb:
The syntactic nominals that are shared with ordinary lexical nominals
Nominalized versions
The arguments of syntactic nominals, just like those of lexical nominals, cannot be marked with a nominative, accusative or dative case. Following are not attested forms in Japanese.
The arguments of these nominals, although both subjects and objects are marked only with genitive cases.
As proven above, syntactic and lexical nominals share some structural similarities. Further analysis reveals that syntactic and constituent at the sentential level are similar as well. This proposes that syntactic nominals are produced at the syntactic level and it can be applied to any clause type. Lexical nominals are created by the lexicon which limits the clauses in which they can be applied.