Determiners as a class of words

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The Article

Lesson 1

Plan

1. Determiners as a class of words

2. Functions of the article

3. Meanings of the articles

1. Determiners as a class of words

Determiners

A. - used to identify things as known or unknown to the listener	B. - “quantifiers”
1.Articles 2. Possessive pronouns 3. Demonstrative pronouns 4. Nouns in the Genitive Case	1. Indefinite Pronouns 2. Cardinal numerals

Two specific features of determiners that distinguish them from other words in a noun phrase are:

1) only one determiner can be used in a noun phrase

2) as a rule, a determiner comes first in a noun phrase

a beautiful red rose, the manager’s office, his new black suit

2. Functions of the article

1) The morphologic function: the article serves as a formal indicator of a noun, that is, the presence of the article shows that what follows is a noun

2) Syntactic functions:

a) The article separates the noun phrase from other parts of the sentence.

John has bought a magazine.

an interesting magazine.

an interesting English magazine.

b) The article may connect sentences within a text by correlating the noun it modifies with a word /group of words in the previous context.

John has bought a magazine. The magazine is interesting.

3) Communicating function:

a) A noun with the indefinite article introduces new information in the sentence; the information is the focus of our attention (the “rheme” of the sentence):

A pretty girl ran into the room.

b) A noun with the definite article in the initial position usually indicates given information (the “theme” of the sentence):

The girl ran into the room.

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