Rules for animate and inanimate nouns. Animate and inanimate nouns

Have you ever heard words that were put in inappropriate cases? Surzhik sins with this - mixed speech from Russian, Ukrainian and Jewish words. This happens because the declension rules in different languages are different.

To correctly choose the case of nouns, you need to know what form they belong to.

Animate and inanimate nouns

Words misused hurt the ear. For their proper use, there are certain rules, not so complicated. In Russia, from ancient times, living and non-living things were changed in different ways in cases. When the language was systematized, it was determined that there are proper nouns and common nouns, animate and inanimate. Moreover, it is not always possible to independently determine what kind a particular word belongs to. The deceased is inanimate, does not have a soul, but the word is grammatically animated. But plants are alive - they grow, breathe. But inanimate. Why?

There is one aspect of this question that is rooted in mythology. In ancient times, people adhered to other ideas about the living and nonliving things. Hence the set of well-established expressions showing the inanimate nature of the sun (it looks out, gets up, sits down, wakes up, in fairy tales it is asked for advice, and it answers) and dolls (in games it eats, sleeps, walks, speaks, cries). Previously, they were really considered alive and this was reflected in linguistic forms. The word "corpse" has always been considered inanimate, because under it only the shell of the being is considered, while the personality is absent. How to identify animate and inanimate nouns?

rule

Since living and non-living answer different questions, it is good to use this method. Then check the result obtained. After that, we can refine our study in accordance with the exceptions that are better to remember.

1. So, first it is worth finding out who or what is in front of us. So in most cases, you can understand what type the word we need belongs to.

2. Later plural the desired word is put in the accusative case (for simplicity, it can be designated VP) and find out which case it coincides with. If with a nominative (IP) - this is inanimateness.

• Toys.
• Armchairs.
• Games.
• Noses.
• Nicknames.

If with a genitive (RP) - animation.

• Puppies.
• Birdies.
• Animals.
• Chickens.
• Friends.

Often this is enough to identify animate and inanimate nouns. The rule has exceptions.

living inanimate

These are dolls, Teddy bears, dogs, bunnies, robots and the like. That is, those toys with which they perform actions, as if they were alive. The existing forms of words will look like this:

• Dolls.
• Mishek.
• Zaichikov.
• Dogs.
• Robots.

Some symbols in games are also considered animated. This should be remembered:

• Kings.
• Valtov.
• Queens.

People who have died or perished are considered to be animate: suicide, deceased, deceased, deceased.

• Suicide.
• Deceased.
• Reposed.
• The dead.

There are many such words, but they are all animate. When it comes to a mortal shell (corpse, body, carrion, carcass) - this is already inanimate.

Fairy-tale and non-material characters (angels, demons, nymphs) are also animated. A regularity is observed: if in the people's mind something is alive - in the declension of such a word VP = RP.

living inanimate

A group, any set, a collection of people, animals or beings classified as living beings are considered to be inanimate. This is a crowd, an army, a people, a herd, a flock, a host. It is correct to say: "I see crowds, armies, peoples, herds, flocks, hosts."

All plants and fungi are inanimate. They have long been considered as food, and not as part of wildlife. Interestingly, some types of seafood (lobsters, oysters, lobsters) first appeared in Russia as exotic dishes. Therefore, in the recipes there is their declension according to the inanimate principle: boil the squid and cut it into the shape of noodles.

What is not visible to the eye is considered inanimate.

These are microorganisms, viruses, embryos, yeast, bacteria. There are interesting exceptions here, though. For example, the attitude towards an embryo changes when it becomes visible - in a test tube.

When it is impossible to determine animate and inanimate nouns

Examples showing the impossibility of attributing a word to a particular division:

• do automation,
• see the swordfish.

These words do not decline in numbers. When changing by cases, they have their own form of endings. Therefore, they are beyond animation.

Helper adjectives

Animate and inanimate nouns are determined by the form of the accusative case of agreeing adjectives. Examples:

• We saw a new student - we saw a new table.
• Stroked a beautiful puppy - stroked a beautiful blouse.
• Got big calves - got big trouble.

First, there is a phrase, where the accusative case is equal to the genitive (VP = RP), and then - the nominative (IP).

These adjectives will make it easier to distinguish between animate and inanimate nouns.

Own and common nouns

Everything proper names nouns are so named because they are the only ones of their kind. Usually these are names, but there may be nicknames and nicknames. If they find a match - it's rather nonsense. For such cases, there is the word "namesake", for example. Even if it is the nickname of an inanimate toy, it is still animated. There are also inanimate names. These are names given to an institution, work of art, or composition. There are also geographic names.

Common nouns - from the Old Slavonic "to name" (to name) - these are the names of groups of objects or concepts.

The table will help to change them by cases correctly.

Skills develop well when filling out such a table. You can fill it in by putting all the words in the accusative case, although this is not necessary. You can simply divide the sheet into four parts and write out the suggested words in groups.

Even better to deal with this topic will help special exercises.

Exercises

They will help to consolidate skills, how to identify animate and inanimate nouns, exercises. You need to substitute the correct word, choose the right case or check the spelling of the written phrase.

Exercise 1

Substitute Right words in the following sentences.

• Coming to school, students see (teachers, director, new desks, posters, friends, duty officer, old doors, school crayons).
• Purchased for the city park (songbirds, carousels, benches, visitors).
• Being late for work, I had to catch up (a trolleybus, a tram, a familiar taxi driver).

Exercise 2

Choose the correct case in the following sentences.

• We housed (kittens) and gave (food bags) for them as well.
• Coming out into the clearing, we saw (boys and baskets of mushrooms).
• At the zoo, keepers feed (birds) and water (trees).

Exercise 3

Give examples of animate and inanimate nouns suitable in the following cases:

• Sitting at the table ... and dreaming.
• The doctors said that ... he was no longer breathing.
• Ours ... completely crumbled.
• How brightly this ... today burns.
• The old one… completely fell apart.

Lesson

In order for students to remember the above rules well, the teacher can devote a lesson to animate and inanimate nouns. It is good to use a scheme denoting the equality of cases.

Odush.	Inanimate
VP = RP	VP = IP

Recalling that the plural is being tested, as an exercise, you can suggest naming five animate and five inanimate nouns while looking at the picture. A photo of a puppy with a toy chicken in its mouth will do.

The resulting phrases will not always be correct, this is natural. But especially funny teacher can emphasize. Such a method "on the contrary" will help to remember misuse cases.

Examples of animate and inanimate nouns that are substituted for missing words will help to understand the rule well. For this exercise, write out in advance on a sheet of sentences with missing words. In their place, one of the suggested words written on the board should be inserted. The teacher makes sure that the students have different variants: on one side of the board are animated, on the other - not.

As one of the options, the following set of words can be used:

Text suitable for this exercise:

The weather was beautiful on the weekend. The guys ran out into the yard. (?) fed and dressed up their (?). (?) did not attract such games, they launched (?) from the mountain. (?) and (?) pleased the old (?). “Where else can you find such (?),” they said, and were in no hurry to call their (?) and (?) home. And the guys have already taken (?) and (?) and made noisy (?).

The kids will love this lesson. The main thing is to prepare visual material and diagrams well. Good luck!

Since elementary school you have an idea about animate and inanimate nature. Nouns are also called objects of animate and inanimate nature. And nouns are divided into animate and inanimate. But not everything is so simple. Many interesting linguistic discoveries await you as you learn to distinguish between animate and inanimate nouns.

All common nouns in Russian are divided into two categories: animate and inanimate. Animate nouns answer the question “who?”, and inanimate nouns answer the question “what?”

For example, "who?" - boy, dog, bird; "what?" - book, stone, earth.

1. Category of animation - inanimateness - grammatical category

It seems that everything is simple: the category of animation - inanimateness is based on the distinction between the living and the inanimate. However, in Russian there are cases when grammar contradicts common sense. It is enough to remember the synonyms dead body and dead man.

The noun "corpse" is inanimate, and the noun "dead" is animate. The difference is found only in the form of B.p. unit: I see a dead person - I see a corpse, compare: I see an elephant - I see a chair.

Animated nouns have the same plural forms V.p. and R.p. (and for nouns m.r. of the 2nd declension and forms V.p. and R.p. singular), but for inanimate ones - no. Inanimate nouns have the same forms I.p. and V.p. plural.

I see (who?) Elephants, there are no (who?) Elephants; I see (who?) mice, there are no (who?) mice.

I see (what?) books, there are no (what?) books; see (what?) at homé, no (what?) houses.

Animated nouns include the names of people, animals, insects, etc., that is, living beings. Inanimate nouns are the names of objects, phenomena of reality that are not classified as living beings.

2. Should pay attention

Note:

• the names of chess and card pieces and the nouns "dead man", "dead man", as well as the names of dolls ( parsley, marionette) and the word “doll” itself are animated nouns;
• and the words that name the totality of living beings: army, people, crowd, flock, students, mankind etc. are inanimate nouns.

Basically, animate nouns include masculine and female. There are few animate neuter nouns in Russian. This includes several nouns with the suffix -ische ( monster, bogeyman), individual nouns (formed from adjectives or participles): mammal, insect, animal and

nouns child, face(meaning "person").

3. Typical mistakes

Errors in the use of the category of animation - inanimate nouns can be divided into two groups:

First- the use of inanimate nouns as animate ones, for example: Everyone looked at him like ghost. Let's check by the formula “V.p. plural = R.p. plural ": (I see) ghosts- (No) ghosts. The endings don't match, hence the noun ghost - inanimate, so the sentence, according to the grammatical norms of the Russian language, should look like this: Everyone looked at him like ghost.

Second- the use of animate nouns as inanimate ones. For instance: When he carried securities, two people were given to accompany him. Right: When he carried securities, he was given as an escorttwo people.

Remember: in constructions with compound numbers ending in two three four, V.p. numeral retains the Im.p. form, regardless of the category of animation. For instance: The driver had to deliver twenty three athlete.

Bibliography

1. Russian language. Grade 6 / Baranov M.T. and others - M .: Education, 2008.
2. Babaitseva V.V., Chesnokova L.D. Russian language. Theory. 5-9 cells - M.: Bustard, 2008.
3. Russian language. 6 cells / Ed. MM. Razumovskaya, P.A. Lekanta. - M.: Bustard, 2010.

1. Terver.ru ().
2. Hi-edu.ru ().

Homework

Exercise 1.

Write the words in 2 columns - animate nouns and inanimate nouns:

Creature, janitor, monster, tin, journalism, youth, insect, engine, coal, corpse, warmth, stubbornness, student, hazel grouse, mushroom, doll, peddler, midge, infantryman, spirit, Sakhalin, children, detachment, steel, coal, poverty, cap, infantry, small fry, general, herd, canned food, table, larva, aluminum, snake, red tape, crow, fox, humanity, relatives, boyar, Karakum, horse, young, genius, youth, bell, milk, chick, silk, scarecrow, pea, tentacle, pea, comrade, cooking, oil, dishes, cement, poor, relative, sugar, tea, honey, kettle, yeast, tea leaf, herd, whiteness, pity, stubborn, hero, furniture, radiance, delight, heroism, running, journalist, walking, pearls, generals, pearl, freshness, crow.

Exercise #2

Read the tale of L. Uspensky:

A raft floats on the river. A fat lazy cat sits motionless on the shore. The raft asks the Cat:

Are you alive?

What can you prove?

I'm moving.

I swim and you sit.

I want to - I will move.

I am a great raft, alive, and cats are inanimate. You are a thing and I exist.

The cat thought and said:

I will prove to you grammatically exactly who is who, and what is what. I'll kill you with the accusative case. Your nominative will not stand against my accusative.

Help the cat, prove that he is right. Using the elements of the essay-reasoning, complete the fairy tale.

Russian language lesson in 5th grade

Textbook: "Russian language: textbook for grade 5
educational institutions"
/ T.A. Ladyzhenskaya, T.M. Baranov and others

Nouns are animate and inanimate.

Target: As a result of the lesson, students should learn:

• understand animateness and inanimateness as grammatical category nouns;
• be able to divide nouns into animate and inanimate, determine the case of a noun;

Formed UUD: regulatory (goal-setting)

Communicative (planning)

Lesson script.

1. Actualization of knowledge.

Before you are nouns, divide them into 2 groups and justify your choice.

Written on the board are the words:willow, spring, mermaid, rooks, drops, hare, forester, corpse, deceased.

Students put forward hypotheses, the teacher fixes their answers on the board. As a result, students come to the conclusion that the words had to be grouped according to the basis of animation / inanimateness. They name the signs by which the animation / inanimateness of a noun is determined (questions WHO? WHAT?, animate nouns denote living beings, they breathe, walk, etc.)

Most likely, students will make a mistake when determining the animation of the word DEAD.

2. Students formulate the topic of the lessonwhich is written on the blackboard and in notebooks.

3. Creation of a problem situation.

The teacher shows on the board (or on a slide) the correct division of nouns into animate / inanimate. Students should be surprised that the word DEAD refers to animate nouns. The teacher asks, “Why does this word refer to animate nouns?” Students do not have this question.

So, there is some other sign, in addition to questions of WHO? WHAT?, which helps to determine the animateness / inanimateness of a noun.

4. Formation of UUD: goal setting.

Formulate a learning goal in front of you by continuing the words: LEARN, LEARN.

What needs to be done to achieve the set goals?

5. Learning new material.

1) Reading the text by receiving an insert.

‒ You not only have to read the text, but also mark your understanding of the text with the appropriate signs.

\/ - “already knew”, + “new”, (-) - “thought differently or did not know”,? - did not understand, there are questions.

text read by students.

THE SECRET OF A NOUN.

ANIMATED AND INANIMATE NOUNS.

Hello guys! It's great to see everyone in my class! Today we will talk about animate and inanimate nouns, - with these words, Professor Link began her lesson at the school of Russian language lovers.

What is there to say? And so everything is clear: if the word denotes a living object, then the noun will be animated, and if it is inanimate, then it will be inanimate, - someone's voice was heard.

Eee ... not everything is so simple ... - answered the professor. - What does it mean - a living thing? Here, for example, the words "plant, tree" where to attribute? Who will turn his tongue to say that a plant is something inanimate? But in Russian, these words refer to inanimate.

Well, this is probably due to the fact that plants themselves cannot move. So they seem to be inanimate, - the girl sitting on the first desk timidly suggested.

To correctly determine whether a noun is animate or inanimate, you need to remember a few rules:

Animated nounsidentify faces and animals and answer the question WHO? ;

Inanimate nounsdesignate objects, plants and phenomena of inanimate nature and answer the question WHAT?

But there are still exceptions. from this rule. There is a very convenient way to distinguish between animate and inanimate nouns, especially if you don’t know exactly what form a given word belongs to. The fact is that animate and inanimate nouns different forms accusative plural. In the animate, the accusative form coincides with the genitive, and in the inanimate, with the nominative. For instance:

2) What new did you learn from what you read? How to determine the animate / inanimate noun?

THEN. In Russian, the division of nouns into animate and inanimate occurs according togrammatical feature.

3) Let's convert our output into a formula. As a result of this work, the following formula should be obtained:Odush: V.p. = R.p. (plural)

Neodush: V.p. = I.p. (plural)

4) Let's see how this formula works on the example of the words CORSE and DEAD.

6. Practical work.

Holding a small research work paired with.

Now you need to do a little research. You will have to determine whether the nouns given to you on the cards are animate or inanimate. As a result of the work, a table “Animate and inanimate nouns” will appear on our board. And then one of your couple will defend their work. But before you get started, remember how to work in pairs. There is a memo “How to work in pairs in a lesson” on your desks, read it, and then proceed to the task.

Formation of UUD: planning.

Memo "How to work in a lesson in pairs"

1. Read the assignment carefully.
2. If you are doing a task with a friend who is approximately equal in strength to you, then try to divide all the work equally. Help each other in case of difficulties.
3. If your friend is doing better than you, do not hesitate to ask him for help, ask him to explain something. Do not be offended by a friend if he corrects this or that mistake.
4. If you see that your friend is doing worse than you, help him, but try to do it in such a way that he himself works with full effort. If your friend makes mistakes, tactfully and kindly correct them.

Remember the main rule: in any collective business, you need coordination of actions and a willingness to help your comrade. You are responsible for him. He is for you.

MATERIALS for research:

What category of nouns (animate or inanimate) do they belong to?

1 row

• Names of gods and mythical creatures: mermaid, goblin.
• Names of chess and card pieces: lady, queen.

2 row

• Nouns that name toys: doll, matryoshka
• Nouns denoting the totality of living beings: battalion people.

3 row

• Collective nouns:youth, humanity.
• Plant nouns: chamomile, birch.

In the course of the performance of two pairs from each row, a table is filled on the board.

7. Implementation of control.

1) Next to the noun, put the letter O if the noun is animate, and H if it is inanimate.

computer
quail
flock
chamomile
pawn
crowd
sprats
bear
Brownie

2) Self-assessment: 0 mistakes - 5 points

1-2 mistakes - 4 points

3-5 points - 3 points

8. Practical work (if time permits).

Read a poem by S. Yesenin. Determine whether they are animate or inanimate nouns in bold. Why are they spoken of as animate? What is the name of such an approach?

The stars dozed off golden,
The mirror of the backwater trembled,
Light shines on the river backwaters
And blushes the grid of the sky.

Sleepy birches smiled ,
Tousled silk braids.
Rustling green earrings,
And silver dews are burning.

The wattle fence has an overgrown nettle
Dressed in bright mother-of-pearl
And, swaying, he whispers playfully:
"Good morning!"

9. Summing up the lesson. Reflection

Let's go back to the objectives of the lesson. Have they been achieved?

Answer the questions:

1. What was the most useful thing for me in the lesson?

2. What was the most interesting thing for me in the lesson?

3. What was difficult for me in the lesson?

10. Homework (differentiated).

Paragraph 91 ex. 480, 481

OR write a story or poem using personification.

1. Gpammatical category of animateness / inanimateness. 2. Ways of expressing animation / inanimateness. 3. The development of the category of animation / inanimateness in the history of the Russian language. 4. Difficulties in word usage associated with the category of animation / inanimateness.

All nouns in modern Russian are divided into animate and inanimate. animated nouns are the names of living beings: brother, sister, antelope, crow etc. inanimate nouns are the names of objects and phenomena of reality that are not classified as living beings: ceiling, wall, window and etc.

the category of animation / inanimateness is a lexical and grammatical category, expressing the forms of wines. n. contrasting grammatically animate and inanimate nouns. In animate nouns wines. n. coincides with the genus., in inanimate - with the forms of them. P.:

The reason for the emergence of this category, the initial stage of formation of which dates back to the preliterate era, was the coincidence of the forms of them. and wine. singular cases of the vast majority of masculine nouns, as a result of which it was impossible to distinguish between the subject and the object of the action. Yes, in the proposal father to see son the carrier of the action and its object are morphologically in no way different. It took the replacement of one of these forms, and in the meaning of wines. n. in such constructions, the form genus began to be used. p., with which fault. p. reveals syntactical proximity (for example, when expressing a partial object: bought meat and bought meat or an object when negated: didn't see the pen and didn't see the pen).

Originally new forms of wines. = genus. cases were used only in the circle of nouns denoting persons, gradually replacing the old forms of wines by the 14th century. = im. cases. Only then wine. = genus. becomes possible with the names of animals and birds, although the old forms of these words are still possible in the written monuments of the 16th and 17th centuries: bought a horse, a gelding, a raven; bought borane and etc.

In the plural, the category of animation was formed much later (starting from the 14th century). At the same time, new forms first acquire the names of males, then the names of females and, finally, nouns denoting animals and birds, which were used as early as the 17th century. most often in the form of wines. = im.: sheep were sheared by Matrena Minina(1639) After prepositions, old forms were possible even in the circle of person names: I bought ... for feeders and spouts and sitters(1614). Wed: for bearers and feeders(ibid.). The examples are taken from North Russian business texts.

It is no coincidence that in modern Russian the forms of wines. = im. preserved in some constructions with prepositions, such as: to elect to deputies, to accept as members of any organization, to go on a visit, to become actors, to promote to officers, to become people(cf.: gather deputies, call guests, meet actors, see officers). Traces of the old form of wines. n. are observed in the adverb married (marry, those. for my husband) and in the obsolete combination on a horse(see A.S. Pushkin: People! on a horse- "The Tale of the Golden Cockerel").

The absence of the category of animation in units. number of nouns. and cf. kind is explained by the fact that the forms of them. and wine. cases of words R. in most cases, primordially differed ( wife to wife, sister to sister), and nouns cf. R. rarely used in the active subject function.

The category of animation can be expressed not only by the forms of wines. etc., but also syntactically, i.e., forms of words consistent with nouns: met my old friend, but: bought a new house, loved his children, but: read the latest newspapers. For indeclinable nouns, it is expressed only syntactically: At the zoo the children saw a funny kangaroo.; She put on a warm coat.

It should be borne in mind that the concept of the grammatical category of animateness or inanimateness does not coincide with the natural science understanding of animate and inanimate nature. So, animated are:

1) words addressee, doll(= toy), face(= person), matryoshka, puppet, dead man, deceased;

2) the names of some card figures and card terms: jack, queen, king, ace; trump;

3) the names of some chess pieces: horse, king, bishop, queen;

4) nouns cf. R. on the - look for: a monster, a monster;

5) nouns in a figurative sense (metaphorical transfer from an inanimate object to a living one): blockhead(“roughly hewn stump of wood, chock; rigid (usually wooden) form for straightening hats, wigs”, inanimate.) - blockhead("stupid, ignorant", odush.); when reversed, nouns retain the category of animation, for example: snake("snake", breath.) - [air] snake("toy", od.).

inanimate are:

1) collective nouns: army, people, flock, crowd and etc.;

2) word character and some others;

3) names of microorganisms: bacterium, microbe, as well as words like larva, pupa, embryo and under.

In the modern Russian literary language, fluctuations in animation / inanimateness are observed, which may depend either on the meaning of the context or on the style of speech. Wed: catchcrabs - there iscrabs ; destroypupae harmful insects(general) - destroypupae harmful insects(scientific).

Didactic material

Put the words in brackets into the appropriate form according to the context. Motivate your choice.

1. Soon the boys found themselves on the roof again. Launched together (serpent) and in turn held a tight, buzzing thread (L. Kassil). 2. Even such phrases: “But I (your ace) on the side, why are they? (N. Pomyalovsky). 3. By type of food (bacteria) divided into autotrophs and heterotrophs (Scientific). 4. - Would you like to eat with me (oysters). (I. A. Goncharov). 5. - Here you will find out how (dolls) steal!.. (A. Averchenko). 6. Grandmaster donated (pawns) heavy and light pieces right and left. He donated even (queen)(I. Ilf and E. Petrov). 7. It smells of fish and lemon, and the perfume of a Parisian woman, who, under a green umbrella, carries (shrimps) in the bank (N. Gumilyov). 8. He was unable to distinguish completeness and perfection in the poor girl, and indeed, perhaps, he took her for ("moral embryo") (F. M. Dostoevsky). 9. Crested hens search in the hay (midges Yes insects)(I. S. Turgenev). 10. He stepped on (starfish crawling) along the bottom (G. Adamov).

Review questions

1. Why do some researchers consider animation - inanimateness not as a grammatical category, but as a lexical and grammatical category of a noun?

2. Why did nouns in the Russian language develop the category of animation and why is it grammatically expressed by the coincidence of the accusative case with the genitive case, and not with the dative case, instrumental case and prepositional case?

3. Why is the grammatical category of animateness - inanimateness universally manifested in all nouns only in the plural?

4. What are the main reasons for fluctuations in animation - inanimateness of nouns in modern Russian?

It seems that to distinguish between animated and inanimate objects to obscenely simple: it's like a game of living-non-living. But those who are guided by this principle are very much mistaken. Animation, as well as inanimateness, respectively, is a separate category in the characteristic that has nothing to do with the external features of some object. Here's how to explain the fact that, according to the rules, the word "corpse" is considered inanimate, and "dead" - animated? Act randomly? In no case! We'll figure out.

For the little ones

Let's start with the very basics. Animate and inanimate objects answer different questions - "who" and "what" respectively. It can be said that the formulation of the question is the most primitive, albeit very unreliable, way of defining this category. Usually children are introduced to him in the first or second grade. In order to practice this method, you can fill in the gaps with the students in the following text:

« In sleepy oblivion flows great (what?). Around (what?) and (what?). (Who?) Slowly moved the skis, shook off (what?) Hats from the ears. (Who?) quickly made a hole, and began (what?). Soon he pulled out a huge (who?). His mirror (what?) shone brightly in the sun". Words to be inserted: ice, scales, fisherman, frost, river, carp, snow, fishing. One word is repeated twice.

Grammar explanation

But it's worth moving on, right? How to determine whether an animate or inanimate object is based on rules, and not on intuition? The difference between these two categories lies in the different case forms of the nouns. Inanimate nouns have the same nominative and plural form, while animate nouns have the same genitive and accusative in the same number. Of course, understand concrete examples it will be much easier.

We take the noun cat". We put it in the plural "cats" and begin to decline: nominative - " cats”, genitive - “ cats", accusative -" cats"- as you can see, the forms of the genitive and accusative cases coincide. Whereas for the noun table”, which, to define this category, becomes “ tables» when declining « tables-tables-tables» the accusative and

Thus, the rule allows to separate an animate and inanimate object only when they are put in the plural and the subsequent declension. And then, already by the coincidence of case forms, this category is determined.

Exceptions

But, as you know, there are very few rules in Russian that do not have any exceptions. So, it is sometimes possible to separate animate and inanimate objects logically. Yes, all living beings will be animate, but at the same time, mythical creatures belong to the same category ( goblin-goblin-goblin-goblin) and toy names ( matryoshka-matryoshka-matryoshka) - here you can still find a logical explanation. As well as card and chess suit-pieces ( spades, spades, pawns, pawns, pawns), which even in their forms do not fit into this category.

Go ahead. Inanimate nouns, in turn, include large groups people ( crowd-crowd-crowd) and some living organisms ( embryos-embryos-embryos; germs-germs-microbes) - it is impossible to explain this phenomenon, you just have to accept and remember.

More difficulties

I would also like to add that animate and inanimate objects in the grammatical sense have their own characteristics. So, for example, for animate masculine nouns, the forms of the genitive and accusative cases coincide and in the singular: Anton-Anton-Anton, accountant-accountant-accountant, however, this phenomenon is observed only in nouns of the second declension (compare: Dima-Dima-Dima, although it is also an animate masculine noun). So, in principle, this pattern can be used as another simple, albeit not very well-known, way to determine the category of animation in nouns.

I want to confuse

It is worth noting that in Russian there is an image of an inanimate object as animated. This is usually associated with the use of the word as an analogy to a living being: There is a mattress in the barn - Yes, the mattress is weak-willed! or Great and mighty is the Russian language! - This language (= captive) will tell us everything.

Exactly the same phenomenon occurs with the use of animate nouns as inanimate ones: Soars in the blue sky Kite; The fighter went down. Here the category of animation and inanimateness is determined based on the semantic content of the noun.

It is worth noting that, despite all the requirements of teachers to use the rules, most students continue to rely on intuition. As the above examples show, inner instinct is not always a reliable assistant in matters of philology. We can definitely say that the names of professions, the names of people by family affiliation, nationality and other groups will always be animated, and the names of animals can also be included here. By the way, among animate nouns, according to some researchers, there are only masculine and feminine words, while the neuter gender is already inanimate, like all names of objects of nature and other objects.

Practice for the little ones

Now that we have figured out how to distinguish one category of nouns from another, it is worth summarizing all of the above. Animate and inanimate objects for preschoolers, who still have no idea what cases are, differ in terms of “who” and “what”, respectively. For practice, you can play with the kids in “living-non-living”, where the word is called, and the child must determine what this object is.

Or another interesting task for younger students is to offer a series of animate nouns that can be turned into inanimate ones by replacing one letter: fox (linden), goat (spit), heron (drop).

I would like to finish the article on how to distinguish between animate and inanimate objects by saying that, no matter how simple this topic may seem, it is better not to tempt fate and not act at random, trusting intuition. A minute spent checking the category of a noun can sometimes change the way you think about it. So spare no effort and practice in the great and mighty Russian language.