English Grammar Notes #3:
ARTICLES
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| DEFINITION (fragment for Definition M2 in LSEG) "Article" is the sentence element used to determine nouns (only). When the noun is accompanied by "definite article", it is marked as being particular among many similar ones; if the article is "indefinite", the noun represents ... The following structure was employed to present the Article: 1. Reading and Writing Articles 2. Using Definite Article 3. Using Indefinite Article 4. Article Omission The article makes no sense by its own: it works only as a noun auxiliary grammatical instrument. Many authors of grammar books consider articles as being determining adjectives, though the idea goes too far. The definite article does have a determining adjective origin, but that was long time ago. Syntactically, adjectives are attributes, while articles have no syntactic function of their own. Articles take the same syntactic function as their determined nouns, which means, articles are (part of) subjects, (noun) attributes, objects, or (noun origin) adverbials. Overall, in addition to being the most used sentence element in English grammar, the article forms a perfectly defined morphologic category. | ||||||||||||
| ATTENTION These Grammar Notes are not sufficient to understand the topics presented. For accurate and detailed information we recommend Logically Structured English Grammar book. | ||||||||||||
English grammar is strongly dependant on its phonetics. For example, the definite article "the" is pronounced differently when it accompanies a noun starting with a consonant or a vowel, although the written form is exactly the same in either case. In other words, "phonetic agreement" plays an important role in English grammar. The following picture is a fragment from LSEG, Table M2.1 : reading articles.  |
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As a main function, definite article is used to mark known or previously mentioned nouns. Definite article was originally a demonstrative adjective, same as "this", "that", "these", and "those". In fact, definite article may replace, and it may be replaced, by "this", "that", "these", and "those" in most instances. Despite its apparent similarity to demonstrative adjectives, definite article has important specific functions. The following picture is a fragment from LSEG, Table M2.4 : using definite article.  NOTE Definite article "the" may also be adverb. Definite article "the" is employed to transform adjectives into nouns. |
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Indefinite article is used to mark its determined noun as being a typical/ordinary representative of its group/category/kind. Indefinite article determines only nouns in singular form, because it has a second function: it replaces numeral "one". Therefore, indefinite article and the noun it determines have to agree in number--which is always singular. The rule is preserved even if the noun has an adjective or adjectival construction ahead having plural meaning. Indefinite article has many functions. The following picture is a fragment from LSEG, Table M2.3 : using indefinite article. 
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The article may be present or not. When the article is missing, due to various circumstances, it doesn't necessarily mean it doesn't exist. For example, the noun "Asia" doesn't take any article, but "Asia" is a unique, huge, important continent, and everybody knows it very well. The fact that we do not use definite article to mark the well known noun "Asia" means the article "the" is implicitly understood, embedded into the name of the noun itself. The notions of "implicit article" and "missing article" are semantic topics, meaning, they can be debated for long periods of time without any benefic results. Practically, two instances of missing article are frequent: 1. when the article is not used 2. when the article is missing on purpose The following picture is a fragment from LSEG, Table M2.5.1 : not used article.  |
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Fragment
from LSEG, Table M2.5.1 : missing article. |
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