1

I am confused why we always use article The even though it is general. For example

1) He can master THE English language (even general statement)
2) The goverment can impose THE goods and services tax to increase the national revenue (even though it is general)
3) Reducing taxes can decrease THE unemployment rate (despite General statement)

Thanks

CowperKettle
  • 36,282
  • 16
  • 126
  • 224
Shahidan Shaari
  • 127
  • 3
  • 6
  • 1
    Using _the_ has nothing to do with being a "general statement" or not. You use _the_ to indicate that the noun phrase it determines has already been mentioned, or is believed by the speaker to be obvious to the listener. So _the English language_ is known to the listener, as are _the ... tax_ and _the ... rate_. – John Lawler Jun 13 '18 at 17:59
  • @JohnLawler What about [here](https://ell.stackexchange.com/q/138461/3395) – the example with *fingers*? Is *the* used because everyone has fingers? (I've excluded the generic meaning because CGEL (Quirk et al.) says [generic NPs aren't normally used with plurals](https://ell.stackexchange.com/questions/138461/curious-use-of-the-definite-article-with-body-parts-in-dictionary-definitions#comment281827_138464).) –  Jun 13 '18 at 18:06
  • But i see people using the even though it is mentioned for the first time and it is unknown to the listener – Shahidan Shaari Jun 13 '18 at 18:11
  • 1
    @ShahidanShaari You should ask a new question about that when you encounter such usage (*the* doesn't have to function as a determiner either, but it can, and it might just be idiomatic in such cases). –  Jun 13 '18 at 18:12
  • 1
    @userr2684291: _the fingers_ is used for the same reason as _the strings_. Everybody has fingers, and every guitar has strings, and these are known to the listener. – John Lawler Jun 13 '18 at 18:26
  • @userr2684291 - A good dictionary entry can answer that. [Macmillan](https://www.macmillandictionary.com/dictionary/british/the), e.g., specifically mentions that the word _the_ is "used when referring to parts of the body." – J.R. Jun 13 '18 at 20:47
  • @J.R. Thank you. However, my intuition tells me that definition is provided to emphasize that the article can be used *instead* of a pronoun like *my* (take a look at the examples (I also checked LDOCE): in all of them the person is mentioned, so it's a different kind of *the* from the one in my original example). Moreover, articles by themselves carry no **lexical** semantic meaning in their determining function (but a **grammatical** one), and are therefore best not analyzed from that (dictionary) perspective – a grammar is very much needed in that case. –  Jun 13 '18 at 21:20
  • @J.R. Actually, see [here (the Collins definition)](https://www.thefreedictionary.com/the); that confirms the doubts I expressed above. Also, I apologize for derailing the discussion pertaining to this question; I simply wanted an opinion from a linguist on an old question of mine (which I believe isn't what the answers say, and J. Lawler above appears to agree with me on that). This question, however, isn't about generic noun phrases (sorry if my linking to or saying something about that confused you). An example of a generic noun phrase is this: ***The lion** is a fierce animal.* –  Jun 13 '18 at 21:28
  • Notice how different that is from *Reducing taxes can decrease the unemployment rate* – it's more like we know exactly which unemployment rate we're talking about – either this country's or an abstract country's one (e.g., in an economics textbook). In the lion example, once again, by contrast, we're not talking about any specific lion. –  Jun 13 '18 at 21:35

0 Answers0