Talk:English articles

Vowel sound disagreement

As an older person born and bred in England, I disagree that the use of AN is applied to Vowel Sounds. I was taught at school that AN was used in front of a word beginning with a vowel (A E I O U) and not with a vowel sound such as S (ess). Therefore, the concept of 'an S' must be American English (American) and NOT English. The exception was with words with a 'silent' aitch (H) such as Hotel (pronounced otel). — Preceding unsigned comment added by Molbrum (talk • contribs) 15:59, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

It's quite plain in the supplied reference (from Cambridge, England): "Any abbreviation beginning with ... S takes an, because of the way these letters are pronounced" (emphasis as original). --Old Moonraker (talk) 16:08, 7 June 2011 (UTC)

Discrimination between a and an

"An analogous distinction to that of "a" and "an" was once present for possessive determiners as well. For example, "my" and "thy" became "mine" and "thine" before a vowel, as in "mine eyes". This usage is now obsolete." - This strikes me as opinion; what source is there that would verify that this usage is obsolete? I would therefore suggest that the final sentence in this paragraph adds nothing to the understanding of the subject and should be removed. Hhosne (talk) 23:08, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Reference added.--Old Moonraker (talk) 05:39, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

When combined with brackets?

I tried to do some research just now but was unable to find a consensus on what to do with a/an in a case involving brackets, where the word inside the bracket starts with a vowel sound and the word outside with a consonant (or vice versa). For example, the sentence "She has taken up a/an (unusual) hobby". The sentence sounds better with an 'an', but only if the bit in brackets is there, which goes against the rules of bracket usage. Does anybody know/know how to find the answer? I have also added this point to the page on brackets. Dragongirlhellfire (talk) 13:48, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

That's an interesting question. The normal answer to any "an or a" question is to go by pronunciation, but the normal rule about editorial insertions into a direct quote is everything outside of the parentheses exactly the same as the actual words the person said. Here, these two seem to conflict. I don't know whether this has ever been explicitly dealt with and kinda doubt it has. What do you think of this? "She has taken up (an unusual) hobby." The fault in this case, omission of one word the quoted person said, doesn't seem as bad as other possible solutions. Chrisrus (talk) 21:15, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

But I think it's still incorrect because the sentence outside of the parentheses is "She has taken up hobby." Generally if I end up in a situation like this I try to find another way to put the sentence, for instance saying "She has taken up a (peculiar) hobby" or something, but it just really seems like there should be a rule to deal with this. Dragongirlhellfire (talk) 01:28, 10 September 2012 (UTC)

Why is the word "unusual" in brackets? If the meaning is that "unusual" is not part of the quote, then the solution is to split "an" (and incidentally square brackets must be used): "She has taken up a[n unusual] hobby." Otherwise, leave out the brackets and use "an". Rothorpe (talk) 02:29, 10 September 2012 (UTC)

I don't know, it was just the first sentence I thought of that was an example. Would that solution work even if it wasn't a quote (and you just really wanted to use some brackets)? I don't see why not, so hey, maybe that's the answer! Dragongirlhellfire (talk) 12:16, 10 September 2012 (UTC)

Yes, if you just want to suggest that "unusual" is optional, "a(n unusual) hobby" would do it. Rothorpe (talk) 12:26, 10 September 2012 (UTC)

I was very happy with the solution of splitting the 'an' except now I can't think how it would work in reverse. Example: "There was a/an (not particularly trustworthy) antidote." There doesn't seem to be a way to split this direction conveniently! Dragongirlhellfire (talk) 12:51, 10 September 2012 (UTC)

(ec) Personally, if I really wanted to use the brackets and it wasn't a quote, I would use "an", in recognition of how I would say it if I were speaking. (In speaking I might indicate the brackets by some kind of voice-lowering or pause or something, or not indicate them successfully at all, but I think I would always say "an".) Victor Yus (talk) 12:29, 10 September 2012 (UTC)

If I were speaking I'd say 'an' (and maybe indicate the brackets vocally as you said), but it just doesn't seem correct when written down. Dragongirlhellfire (talk) 12:51, 10 September 2012 (UTC)

That's because you've been thinking about it. "There was a (not particularly trustworthy) antidote" reads well. Rothorpe (talk) 13:09, 10 September 2012 (UTC)

Yes, I agree. Under normal circumstances I don't think a reader's going to notice anything amiss in sentences like this. (Whereas if you use less natural devices like a/an or a(n ...) then the reader is going to stumble.) Victor Yus (talk) 14:02, 10 September 2012 (UTC)

Juncture loss

A common example of juncture loss happening right now is with the word another. Its root is other, so with an indefinite article it would become an other, contracted to another.

But when splitting it to add an emphasizing word, the root gets changed; thus, rather than "a whole other", we often hear "a whole nother". This would seem to stem from a desire not to alter the original word another when splitting it, but also wanting to place the correct article a in front of the word whole.

This explanation can be tested by using a different word such as entire. In this case, the most natural phrase is "an entire other", not "an entire nother".

So now that I have advanced my original research, are there any legitimate references that discuss this phenomenon? TWCarlson (talk) 18:28, 30 August 2012 (UTC)

a nickname was once an ekename, where eke means "extra" (as in eke out meaning "add to")

In Norwegian this is "økenavn", which to my uneducated self seems a more plausible etymology for ekename than the above. Also original research. Gunnstein (talk) 15:37, 20 March 2023 (UTC)

Cleanup-merge templates

@Beland: I can't figure out why you added those templates. Could you please clarify? I find them unhelpful because I don't see what exactly needs to be cleaned up and what has been merged from where. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 22:59, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

@Florian Blaschke: I think those are left over from an earlier usage (or maybe I used the wrong template by mistake) and the meaning is that the tagged sections should be merged with other sections in this article. -- Beland (talk) 23:17, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

Oh, I see now, thanks. Yeah, that makes sense, but the purpose of {{cleanup-merge}} is different. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 23:38, 12 January 2016 (UTC)

Rules on use of articles should be more detailed

For example, the phrase "He is a person" should be not be written this way as the rule says that "a" article, that is short of "any", should be used when specificity is not indicated. However, as it can be seen, the phrase clearly indicates specific person, "he". And yet "a" article is used anyway, because there is an exception to the rule.

Another example: "He is a good person" should not be written as such because there is already qualifier "good" in the front of "person", you have defined specific type of a person, so there should not be an "a" before "good". However, the use of "a" is correct in this case, since there is a way to be even more specific within "good person" category. So there are nuances in the rules on for how long it can go before an article can be dropped, and why in some cases it has to be omitted right from the moment of using of the very first qualifier in the front of a noun, and in others you can add more and more qualifiers and yet "a" is still necessary.

Should those rules be explained in the article, at least concisely? 95.27.77.158 (talk) 06:23, 13 July 2016 (UTC)

Further adjectival functions

[3] i such a nuisance   so serious a problem      [predeterminer]

[....]

Predeterminer AdjPs occur as external modifier in NP structure, preceding the definite article a [emphasis added]. This construction is subject to highly restrictive structural conditions described in ¶3.3. All adjectives that can head a predeterminer AdjP can also be used attributively - cf. such tools, a serious problem.

¶3.3 refers to "the article a", but doesn't say that it is a definite article. The extensive discussion of a as an article does not refer to any use as a definite article.

I have yet to find anything else that analyzes a as a definite article. Could this be true? DCDuring (talk) 15:38, 15 October 2018 (UTC)

It's a typo. See The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language: Errata et Corrigenda.

--Boson (talk) 08:02, 17 October 2018 (UTC)

I know. I emailed Pullum. He made the correction yesterday. DCDuring (talk) 14:19, 17 October 2018 (UTC)