Dave's ESL Cafe's Student Discussion Forums

[musicgold]

Hi,

I am confused about the use of �additional� and �an additional� . Could you explain this to me this using the following sentences?

1. The company acquired an additional property comprising 24,500 sf of development space from Xyz corp. for $7.9 million.

2. An additional 8 properties are being marketed for sale.

Thanks,

MG

[Suzanne]

Hi, MG--

1. The company acquired an additional property comprising 24,500 sf of development space from Xyz corp. for $7.9 million.

There is only one more property, so "an" is used to indicate singular.

2. An additional 8 properties are being marketed for sale.

This should say, Eight additional properties are being marketed for sale. Because there are more than one, "an" is not correct.

Does that help?

[musicgold]

Suzzane,

Thanks. Both the sentences I cited earlier are from the media. As for the second sentence, I saw many native speakers using similar structures. The following sentences are additional examples I found in the media. I don't understand why 'an' is being used for plural nouns.

3. The Netherlands has pledged an additional 6.3 million euros in support of the FAO/Netherlands Partnership Programme.

4. Legislation that would give unemployed workers an additional 13 weeks of jobless benefits advanced in the U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday.

Thanks,

MG.

[Suzanne]

Thanks for writing back! Now I understand your question better. "An additional" means more or extra of something that has already been named or described.

"an additional 6.3 million euros" means that euros have already been given to the FAO/Netherlands Partnership Programme. These 6.3 million are more than the original amount.

"an additional 13 weeks" means that whatever time unemployed workers are given, the legislation will give them another 13 weeks.

"An" is used as an indefinite article, to describe something in general.

Hopefully, I've done a better job explaining this time. If not, let me know!

[musicgold]

Suzzane,

Thanks. Now I have two questions.

1. Given what you have explained, when does one need to use only 'additional'? See the sentence below, which uses only 'additional'. Here also the observations seem to have been sent in addition to what were sent before that, but the writer has not used 'an additional'.

'Thanks to the numerous readers who sent in additional observations on Mac OS X'

2. in sentence #3 or 4, what is the noun for which we are using 'an'?
For example, in the following sentence, 'a' is for 'flower' and not for 'big' or 'colorful'.


'I saw a big colourful flower'

Thanks,

MG.