My Grammar and I (Or Should That Be 'Me'?): Old-School Ways to Sharpen Your English

D
EFINITELY INDEFINITE
(
OR
, A
RTICLES
)
‘A horse, a horse, my kingdom for a horse.’
S
HAKESPEARE
, Richard III .

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An article is any one of a group of things. I have lost an article of luggage , for
example, means you have lost only one bag of several. In grammar an article is
any one of the words a , an and the .
A  and  an  are  known  as  indefinite  articles  because  they  describe  nouns  in
general.  The  restricts  the  meaning  of  a  noun  to  make  it  more  specific.  Or
definite. It is therefore known as the definite article .
A drunk man
any old drunk man (he could be anyone – we
haven’t mentioned him yet)
The drunk man
a specific drunk man (someone we are already
talking about)
A drunk man
was lurching
down the street.
This implies the man is a stranger to all.
The drunk man
was crawling
down the street.
This implies the speaker/writer or listener/reader
already knows something about this man – he has
already cropped up.
Bizarrely, however, when speaking in very general terms, the can be used instead
of a to make something less specific:
There was a tiger in my
garden.
an individual animal
The tiger is an
endangered species.
that is, all of them
I bought a ukulele .
one specific instrument
I play the ukulele.
I can pick up any ukulele and strum away
happily on it