I know that definite article is used when a noun is already known in the context.  But I'm not sure with the usage of definite article when I described something explicitly but it hasn't been mentioned before.  So here's my example.  'I believe children are used to listening to the type of music that celebrities promote their life styles'  In the sentence, 'the type of music' was not mentioned before, however I described what type of music it is in the sentence. Also it sounds more comfortable with the article.  Is the article used right? or should it be just 'a type of music'?  Thanks for reading my question.
4654
I can’t for the life of me figure out where to use a and where to use the — and where there is no article at all. Is there a simple rule of thumb to memorize?   The standard rule you always hear:     “If a person knows which item you are talking about then use "the"   . . . doesn’t clear things up for me, as I have no idea whether or not they know.
52129
Is something the matter?  I've read or heard this usage of matter many times. For instance, in The pleasure of finding things out, R.P. Feynman writes:  I could tell that something was the matter.  This usage doesn't seem right to me. It's hard for me to pinpoint what exactly bothers me, but I think it has to do with the use of the definite article &quot;the&quot; when the existence of a problem hasn't even been confirmed/acknowledged yet. I know this usage of matter is accepted by many, but how does it make logical/grammatical sense?  Instead of:  Is something the matter?  I would much prefer  Is there a problem?  Instead of  I could tell that something was the matter.  I would prefer  I could tell that there was a problem/issue.  Note that my issue is with the choice of article, not with that of the noun.
45696
"He was watching the television when I called on him."  When I said this sentence to one of my friends  (an English teacher)  he corrected me saying that the definite article (the) should be omitted. Still, I can't understand why. ? Actually similar  question has been asked earlier but the answers were so ambiguous. So I put complete sentence.
108642
I was in a Teacher's selection for a school in my country, and one of the coordinators said that she heard a mistake from another teacher that was unacceptable. I tried to figure out why was that, but I thought it was silly and forgot about it. Then I was asking about the weekend in my classroom and one of my Ss said the same sentence. I corrected him according to the coordinator, as she is way more experienced than me, but I couldn't actually explain why to him. The sentence was:     I went to the church.   I can't see the mistake in this sentence if the church had been previously mentioned in the context of the conversation. I understand, as a non-native speaker, that if you are talking to a person that doesn't have any idea of where you were and doesn't have any previous information about the specific place, the article 'the' should not be used. Also, I am assuming church as a count noun. So instead, we would say:     I went to a church.   Is it correct to use the indefinite article since I don't have any idea of which church he is talking about?   I made a research about it and found that places that people use in common (like school, church, hospital, work) but are not necessarily the same, we would omit the article, so we would use the sentence that the coordinator accept:      I went to church.   Like this sounds strange to me, but since I am not a native speaker, I think that it is OK.   I really don't think that it was an unacceptable mistake, since the use of the article will depend on the context. So, if I am talking to my student, asking what he did last weekend and we were not talking about anything before, which one should he use?
78315
I've seen a lot of times the pronoun them used like an article. For example, in the title of the Delta Rhythm Boys Them bones, or in the first sentence of "Money for nothing":     Now look at them yo-yo's, that's the way you do it.   I know that it's not "proper English" (i.e., not something you'll use in a serious writing), but I'd like to know when it's commonly used, and why. Is there any difference between using it and using the?
2074
In the following example, is it appropriate to use a or an as the indefinite article, and why?     He ate __ green apple.   I know that in the case of just "apple", it would be "an apple," but I've heard conflicting answers for "green apple," where the noun is separated from the article by an adjective.  Also, which is more appropriate in this case:     He ate  __ enormous Pop-Tart.
85663
Usually, we do not use the definite article, the, before names of countries but we use the before "United States of America".   Is there a specific reason for using the article before the country "United States of America"?
66659
Adjectives are placed before nouns. But sometimes I've seen (though I'm not sure if they are correct), things like:     The item placed there   I know that it may be a short way of saying "The item which is placed there".    Is the past participle "placed" considered as an adjective in that sentence? Can any past participle used in this way by ommiting the relative pronoun+subject of the relative clause? Is there any exception for the rule that adjectives must be placed before noun?
74467
I used the book "Grammar and Style" and one example confused me:      He was the better/ best of two players.    The answer was the better but learners wonder how is it true since we use best after the definite article, the.   Was the answer given above correct?
1469
How do I know whether to use the definite (the) or indefinite (a, an) article, and when to omit it altogether?
120184
In most sentences that use the word lunch, I found this word does rarely take the definite article the. For example:     I have lunch in three hours.      Shall we go out for lunch?      Let's have some lunch.      I'll take my lunch to school.   But now I wonder if this word really cannot take the definite article, and if it can, in what cases do I use the definite article and in what cases not?  And also, if the word lunch cannot take the definite article, why cannot it have it?
26351
I am confused with the use of an indefinite article in front of British or Chinese.  To my understanding, we can place an indefinite article in front of any “countable noun”.  So, we can say a cup and an orange.   But when it comes to nationalities, it is very confusing. For example, we can say an American or a German. But we cannot say a British or a Chinese.   I looked them up in a dictionary as at first I thought British and Chinese are adjectives in the above statement and that is why we cannot place an article in front of it.   However, the dictionary mentions that they are nouns.  Does that mean they are uncountable nouns?
34756
I'm having difficulty determining if certain nouns are considered places or things. For example, I'm unsure if 'a park' is a place or a thing. More generally, with the standard definition of a noun as a person, place, thing, or idea, how does one determine the difference between a place, thing, idea, etc. Another example could be 'heaven', is this a place or an idea? I'd greatly appreciate any help. Thank you.
68509
The indefinite article a(n), derives from the old English word an meaning "one". Generally this word only occurs in determiner function before noun phrases which are singular. However, there seem to be some cases where this determiner occurs before plural noun phrases. I say that, but actually these noun phrase seem so bizarre to me, in terms of their structure, that I'm not sure they're definitely noun phrases at all. Here are some examples:   a full three months before we left an amazing two days an awkward ten minutes   Ignoring the article here for a moment, these noun phrases are odd because the adjective is occurring before the numeral. We would normally expect to see:   three full months two amazing days ten awkward minutes   Even given the oddness of the word order in the original phrases, I can see no reason why the normally singular indefinite article is licensed here.   Can anybody give an account of the syntactic structure of these phrases, and/or explain why the semantically singular article is able to be used with such phrases - even if they compulsorily trigger plural verb agreement?  Here is an example of one of these instances which seems to demand a plural verb:   An amazing two million people attend every year. *An amazing two million people attends every year. (ungrammatical)
115542
When I look at the definition given from the Mac OS X Dictionary (I have set American English as interface language, and the dictionary used is then the New Oxford American Dictionary), I read:     the /ði/ /ð(ə)/ /ði/ [called the definite article]   adjective   1. denoting one or more people or things already mentioned or assumed to be common knowledge: what's the matter? | call the doctor | the phone rang. Compare with a.   • used to refer to a person, place, or thing that is unique: the Queen | the Mona Lisa | the Nile.   • informal denoting a disease or affliction: I've got the flu.   • (with a unit of time) the present; the current: dish of the day | man of the moment.   • informal used instead of a possessive to refer to someone with whom the speaker or person addressed is associated: I'm meeting the boss | how's the family?   • used with a surname to refer to a family or married couple: the Johnsons were not wealthy.   • used before the surname of the chief of a Scottish or Irish clan: the O'Donoghue.   I have never thought of an article as adjective. Is normally an article defined as adjective?
71988
I often hear people saying what kind of [singular noun] rather than what kind of a [singular noun].  Are we not supposed to use an article (a) before noun?
97237
Some ships in Star Trek are referred to with definite articles. "The Enterprise", "The Defiant". Other ships are referred to without them. "Voyager", "Enterprise". Is there a pattern to or explanation for this behavior?