A noun that refers to something that can be directly perceived by the five senses, such as baby, frog, or skyscraper. Concrete nouns express a different type of meaning from abstract nouns like sadness.

It is debatable whether non-tangible things that can be perceived by the senses, such as sound, are concrete. Nouns like pain can be seen as having a concrete meaning ("physical pain" perceived by the five senses) and an abstract meaning ("emotional pain" not perceived by the five senses).



Nouns: Concrete and abstract

Strictly speaking, the distinction between concrete noun and abstract noun is not really a matter of grammar, but of semantics. In other words, the decision to label a noun as concrete or abstract is more to do with the word’s meaning than its grammatical form or function.

There is very little, if any, grammatical difference between the ways in which abstract and concrete nouns operate.


