2018-05-07 Grammar: articles, generic/particular

Greg Malivuk
[email protected]
http://www.pastebin.com/u/gmalivuk - notes from all classes
---
Determiners: words before a noun to tell you which one(s) or how many
- articles: a/an, the, (some)
- demonstratives: this, that, these, those
- possessives: my, his, their, Greg’s
- quantifiers: many, some, three, a few, a little
---
Nouns can be count/countable or noncount/uncountable.
(I sometimes prefer “count” and “noncount” because “money” is a noncount noun, but of course in the real world you can count money.)
Many nouns have both count and noncount meanings:
a chicken (count) = the whole animal (alive or dead)
some chicken (noncount) = the meat
---
∅ = the zero article (This means there is no article.)
p. 315 exercise 2 - Which article(s) can NOT be used with these nouns
1 a, an
2 an (“a water” could be an order in a restaurant, or if you’d like a bottle of water)
3 a, some, ∅
4 an, some, ∅ (The first sound in “university” is /y/, which is a consonant sound.)
5 a, some, ∅
6 a, an (it’s noncount), some (it’s not quantifiable)
7 a, an
8 a, an
9 an, some, ∅
Note: “some” can be used with singular nouns when it has a meaning similar to “something” or “someone”. However, it is not an article in that case (it’s more of an adjective), so don’t include it for this exercise.
---
Generic and Particular Nouns
---
generic nouns refer to general concepts or categories
particular nouns refer to real members of those categories (someone could go and find the noun(s) you’re talking about); we can ask more questions about particular nouns
---
exercise 3 - Are the nouns in these sentences generic or particular?
1 P - I can ask, “How much did they cost?”
2 G
3 P
4 G
5 G
6 P
7 G
8 P
9 P
10 G
11 P
12 G
---
Exercise 4 - Write one particular and one generic sentence for each noun phrase.
2 P: I will buy a new car next week.
  G: A new car is not a good gift for a 16-year-old.
3 P: The English language spoken in Boston is very different from the English in Scotland.
  G: I want to learn the English language. The English language is spoken by 2 billion people.
---
Homework: finish exercise 4