Count vs. mass — where can you look this up?

Question

Most dictionaries don't say whether a noun is count vs. mass.  Short of asking a fluent English speaker, where can you get this kind of information?

I've tried asking various other ESL/EFL people I know this same question, and also tried googling it, but to no avail.

John Lawler · Accepted Answer

Most English dictionaries used and published in the United States don't include that information, just as they don't provide IPA-based phonemic transcription. However, dictionaries published in the UK and elsewhere sometimes do, especially dictionaries for English learners.

One American online exception is Merriam-Webster's Learner's Dictionary, which dutifully reports that pea and bean are both [count], while rice and sand are both [noncount].

Fraser Orr · Answer

You should try Wiktionary. It lists the plural, or indicates that the noun is uncountable. For example, rice is listed as uncountable, and bean has the plural listed as beans.

Edwin Ashworth · Answer

Beware broad-brush approaches, even if you find a dictionary offering the count – uncount classification. Some – perhaps many – nouns are non-count in some senses and count in others. Coffee is a good example – its basic sense is uncount:

Coffee is a drink made by infusing the ground beans of Coffea arabica
etc.
Too much coffee can be bad for you.

However, different products will be count:

Coffees produced using a higher proportion of robusta beans in the
blend tend to be bitter and have less flavour but better body than
those with a higher proportion of arabica beans.

And ellipsis produces another count-noun polyseme:

Two coffees, please.
(ie two cups / mugs of coffee)

Rice is count when different strains are meant, and sand when different sorts are being mentioned. (There is a poetic use of sands also.) Even furnitures is allowed in certain situations.
There are also grey areas – you'd probably ask for less peas rather than fewer peas (especially if they were mushy) on your plate. Non-count doesn't always mean that counting would be impossible - confetti is treated as a singular non-count noun. The difficulty ensuing when one tries to use algae in both count and non-count senses has recently been addressed in a different thread.
A good place to start looking is http://learnenglish.britishcouncil.org/en/english-grammar/nouns/common-problems-countuncount-nouns .

Count vs. mass — where can you look this up?

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