singularnominative

Singular nominative is the grammatical category that combines singular number with the nominative case, used for the subject of a verb or a clause in languages that mark both number and case. In inflected languages, the noun and any accompanying determiners or adjectives often take a distinct nominative singular form, different from other cases and from the plural.

In languages with nominative–accusative alignment, the nominative case marks the subject of intransitive verbs and the subject of transitive verbs, with the singular form used for a single subject and the plural form for multiple subjects. For example, in German the nominative singular marks the subject: Der Hund schläft. In a language like Russian, nominative singular also marks the subject, though nouns change form for other cases as well.

English provides a limited contrast: nouns typically do not change form for case in the singular, but pronouns have distinct nominative forms used as subjects, such as I, you, he, she, it, we, they. A sentence like She runs and I run illustrates nominative_subject forms in the singular for pronouns, while nouns remain unchanged.

In linguistic descriptions, the singular nominative is often abbreviated as NOM.SG or similar, and is contrasted with NOM.PL (nominative plural) and with other cases (accusative, dative, etc.). Understanding singular nominative helps clarify how subject marking functions within a language’s morphology and syntax, especially in languages with rich case systems or explicit noun-adjective agreement.