Page 39 - Basic English Usage

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39 articles: a/an
A noun like house, engineer, girl, name refers to a whole class of people
or things.
We use a/an with a noun to talk about just one member of that class.
(A/an means ‘one’.)
She lives in a nice big house.
My father is an engineer. (NOT My fatheris- engineer)
A girl phoned this morning. Tanaka is a Japanese name.
We use a/an when we define or describe people or things (when we say
what class or kind they belong to).
He’sadoctor. She's a beautiful woman.
‘What's that?’ ‘It’s a calculator.’

We do not use a/an with a plural or uncountable noun (see 92), because
a@/an means ‘one’.
My parents are doctors. (NOT ... @deeters-)
Would you like some salt?(NOT . . . @-satt)
We do not use a/anwith an adjective alone (without a noun). Compare:
She's a very good engineer.
She's very good. (NOT She's avery geod)
We do not use a/an together with another determiner (for example my,
your).
He's a friend of mine. (NOT He's-amy friera-)

Note that we write another in one word.
Would you like another drink? (NOT ... @rretherdrink?)
For the exact difference between a and an, see 44
For the difference between a/an and the, see 41.
For the use of some with plural and uncountable nouns, see 316.

40 articles: the
The means something like ‘you know which one | mean’. It is used with
uncountable (see 92), singular and plural nouns.
the water (uncountable) __ the tab/e (singular countable)
the stars (plural countable)
We use the:
a. to talk about people and things that we have already mentioned.
She's got two children. a girl and a boy. The boy's fourteen and the
girl's eight.
b. when we are saying which people or things we mean.
Who's the girl in the car over there with John?