A noun string is a term for a series of
nouns
A noun () is a word that generally functions as the name of a specific object or set of objects, such as living creatures, places, actions, qualities, states of existence, or ideas.Example nouns for:
* Living creatures (including people, alive, ...
or other words, all of which modify the final noun. For example, in the noun string “U.S. energy consumption” the nouns "U.S." and "energy" modify the final noun "consumption." Noun strings are frequently used in
technical writing
Technical writing is writing or drafting technical communication used in technical and occupational fields, such as computer hardware and software, architecture, engineering, chemistry, aeronautics, robotics, finance, medical, consumer electron ...
, but appear in other general business contexts as well.
As a usage problem
Since connecting elements such as
prepositions
Prepositions and postpositions, together called adpositions (or broadly, in traditional grammar, simply prepositions), are a class of words used to express spatial or temporal relations (''in'', ''under'', ''towards'', ''before'') or mark various ...
or
apostrophes
The apostrophe ( or ) is a punctuation mark, and sometimes a diacritical mark, in languages that use the Latin alphabet and some other alphabets. In English, the apostrophe is used for two basic purposes:
* The marking of the omission of one o ...
are omitted from noun strings, readers must infer the relationship between the words. If the string is fairly short and the reader is already familiar with the field, he or she will probably be able to interpret a noun string without too much difficulty. When strings become longer than three words, they can make readers labor. This is particularly true when the reader is not already familiar with the subject or technical domain.
Because of this problem, overly long noun strings are increasingly recognized as a problem in technical and business writing. For instance, a noun string like "Municipal Solid Waste Classification Methodology" though not incomprehensible, is at least irritating to most readers. According to Burnett,
[Burnett, Rebecca (2001). ''Technical Communication'', p. 450. Harcourt, Fort Worth. .] strings of five words or more are open to several different interpretations and can be indecipherable. Because of these problems, most guides to technical writing advise writers to either limit the length of nouns strings or to avoid them altogether.
Fixing problems with noun strings
To make long noun strings easier to understand, hyphenation can often help, as can using prepositions to show the relationship between the words, and converting the noun that hides the key action to a verb. Often, the string can be shortened by removing unnecessary words as well. Here are several examples:
See also
*
Noun adjunct
In grammar, a noun adjunct, attributive noun, qualifying noun, noun (pre)modifier, or apposite noun is an optional noun that modifies another noun; functioning similarly to an adjective, it is, more specifically, a noun functioning as a pre-modif ...
*
Noun phrase
In linguistics, a noun phrase, or nominal (phrase), is a phrase that has a noun or pronoun as its head or performs the same grammatical function as a noun. Noun phrases are very common cross-linguistically, and they may be the most frequently o ...
External links
* http://web.uvic.ca/wguide/Pages/SentNounStr.html
* http://writing.wisc.edu/Handbook/CCS_nounstrings.html
* http://www.grammarly.com/handbook/grammar/nouns/15/noun-strings/
References
{{Reflist
Syntactic entities
Phrases
Grammar