the man in a/the sweater

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jotham
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Post by jotham » Wed Jan 17, 2007 1:55 pm

So Clinton saw the devil in a blue dress
Again, isn't this prepositional phrase adverbial? Not sure. But this sentence sounds okay to me. I think it's because the devil is someone specific, a title — unlike the man, at least in our examples. It's like saying I saw Jill in a blue dress. And thus no identification is necessary.
Last edited by jotham on Fri Aug 10, 2007 4:28 pm, edited 2 times in total.

jotham
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Post by jotham » Wed Jan 17, 2007 2:01 pm

metal56 wrote:Could we choose to use "the" here?

"Backing from her driveway, turning left, right, and then straight through the green light, onto the busy street out of her neighborhood, she never saw the young mother in a blue van reach back to swat her restless boys. Never saw as the van raced though the red light. Never saw the pale young mother’s mouth turn into an O of surprise. She saw Jon Peter again, wings aflame, as her face made contact with the steering wheel."
I don't think I would say it this way. I would have chosen the. Is this a British author?

Stephen Jones
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Post by Stephen Jones » Wed Jan 17, 2007 2:39 pm

You seem to have this fixation jotham, with claiming choices in English should fit into a British/American distinction.

The truth is that you are using this rather as a way of avoiding the question. If you want to claim that the difference between 'a' and 'the' in these cases is a British/American difference you need to provide detailed analysis of a reasonable set of examples from both and show that the American strongly favours using one form whilst the British strongly favour using another.

I doubt if you will be able to do this.

In your particular example we have pointed out that both examples are right and common. We have tried to explain the difference between using 'a' and 'the' and that in the particular case you refer to both are correct, and almost interchangeable.

You should not attempt to make hard and fast rules for the sake of it.

metal56
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Post by metal56 » Wed Jan 17, 2007 4:59 pm

jotham wrote: I don't think I would say it this way. I would have chosen the. Is this a British author?
Nope, she be one of you.

http://www.theroseandthornezine.com/Sum ... ility.html

metal56
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Post by metal56 » Wed Jan 17, 2007 5:03 pm

You should not attempt to make hard and fast rules for the sake of it.
With Jotham, I get more of a sense of "I can't believe the Brits are so stupid in their usage" type posts.

We are not fooled by the smoke and mirrors though.

Stephen Jones
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Post by Stephen Jones » Wed Jan 17, 2007 8:24 pm

The construction jotham objects to is in fact not very common. Google seems to give strange results when I use it to search for this construction so I have used Yahoo, and the trope "the noun with/in a" is thirty to fifty times less common than "the noun with/in the".

The only exception is the example I referred to in a previous posting "the man with a big dick" which gets 15 hits to 40 for "the man with the big dick."

Searching the BNC for "the man in a " as opposed to "the man in the" I find eleven hits to three hundred, the same proportion again, suggesting it is not a Brit/American difference.

jotham
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Post by jotham » Thu Jan 18, 2007 12:57 am

You seem to have this fixation jotham, with claiming choices in English should fit into a British/American distinction.
I may have been playing devil's advocate, but don't get me wrong; I've just learned that this is possible. I don't know why certain people find it strange while others find it okay. Attributing it to a British-American difference sounded like a plausible theory, but I'm open-minded for other explanations.
Yesterday, I was told that the the government committee (of non-native speakers) will change all our the's to a's and probably indiscriminately unless we show them proof that our way is legitimate somehow. I want to at least show them that they have to keep nuances in mind if they use it (i.e., you can't just always do it one way or the other all the time) or even that our way of doing it is prominent English, especially American, which is what we purport to teach. We've discussed it here on the board, but I really don't have any hard evidence or sources to show the committee to justify our use other than Google and Yahoo searches, or to justify using the differences in a logical way (to those who use the man/a sweater).
I guess I've stumbled upon some language phenomena that scholars haven't picked up on, studied, commented, or noticed before.

Stephen Jones
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Post by Stephen Jones » Thu Jan 18, 2007 1:32 am

The governement committee seems a bit extreme.

As for hard evidence the thirty to one difference in favour of 'the' shown by Yahoo searches and the British National Corpus should be more than enough to persuade them to keep'the'.

metal56
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Post by metal56 » Thu Jan 18, 2007 9:14 am

jotham wrote:
Not sure. But this sentence sounds okay to me. I think it's because the devil is someone specific, a title---unlike the man, at least in our examples. It's like saying I saw Jill in a blue dress. And thus no identification is necessary.
I agree.

metal56
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Post by metal56 » Thu Jan 18, 2007 9:18 am

I don't know why certain people find it strange while others find it okay.
Same reason why some people find I am understanding it or She is knowing the answer odd and others do not.

metal56
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Post by metal56 » Thu Jan 18, 2007 9:28 am

Jotham, try contacting this person:Alena Kandratsenka. akandratsenkayahoo.com

Maybe she can help with your query.

See her here:

http://linguistlist.org/issues/13/13-1107.html

And, which would you use here and why?

She reads a newspaper every day.
She reads the newpaper every day.

I've just missed the bus. I'll be there as soon as I can.
I've just missed a bus. I'll be there as soon as I can.

She always misses the bus.
She always misses a bus.
Last edited by metal56 on Fri Jan 19, 2007 8:45 am, edited 1 time in total.

jotham
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Post by jotham » Fri Jan 19, 2007 5:15 am

And, which would you use here and why?
She reads a newspaper every day.
She reads the newpaper every day.
I would use the second one casually, and the first one specially, like when learning a language using a newspaper, or someone needing to browse through 1930 newspapers for some lost event.
I've just missed the bus. I'll be there as soon as I can.
I've just missed a bus. I'll be there as soon as I can.
The first one is more likely if there is only one that comes by, like a school bus, but not necessarily. The second one if city buses come, the more frequently the more natural, like every 5 minutes, or every minute. If it were 30 minutes, maybe the first one is also okay, or better.
She always misses the bus.
She always misses a bus.
I can't imagine saying the second one unless really removed from ordinary contexts, like someone with a rocket launcher who, using math equations, positions and aims so that all three, five, or twenty buses in a parking lot explode in one shot. Or even shoots them out one by one but always forgets one.
Thanks for the link. I also tried your other three links, but none of them seemed to address the case specifically.

metal56
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Post by metal56 » Fri Jan 19, 2007 7:30 am

Not sure of your reasoning here.

For "I've just missed the bus", you say:
The first one is more likely if there is only one that comes by, like a school bus, but not necessarily.
but, for "She always misses the bus", you then say:
I can't imagine saying the second one unless really removed from ordinary contexts...
So what about this exchange?

Tod: Sarah's just phoned. She said she's missed the bus and will be late.

Bod: OK, we'll wait for her for twenty minutes and then begin if she's not here. Why does she always miss the bus? She should get a new watch.

JuanTwoThree
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Location: Spain

Post by JuanTwoThree » Fri Jan 19, 2007 8:37 am

It's a tough one:

You wake up in a hotel room on your first ever visit to a city where there are 200 banks. You need to change some money and you have no particular preference as to bank. You think/say:

"I need to go to the bank" (I'm beginning to sound like Raymond Murphy)

You might also say "I need to go to a bank" but then you think:

"This afternoon I'll go to the cinema, or maybe the theatre"

We seem to live in our minds in a small town where there's one of everything. Something like Trumpton. Even on Oxford Street where every single bus that comes along will take you to the other end (I think) you might say "Here comes the bus".

OK it might be explained by "the nearest bank" "the cinema where there's a film I'd enjoy" "the bus I'm going to catch" but some destinations have been elevated to this "the" status (the pub) and others, equally ubiquitous or more so, haven't:

"Let's go to the Indian restaurant/hotel/mall/bordello/chip-shop/lap-dancing club" (though not necessarily in that order) would have to be destinations known to the listener, however common they may be.

metal56
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Post by metal56 » Fri Jan 19, 2007 8:54 am

"Let's go to the Indian restaurant/hotel/mall/bordello/chip-shop/lap-dancing club" (though not necessarily in that order) would have to be destinations known to the listener, however common they may be.
Yes, we assume that there will be a bank, but not an Indian, in every town, village, mall, etc.

And "go to the bank", like "get the bus/train", is a regular, universal action for many people, so the definite article fits well.

go to a bank (picture the building, being in it)
go to the bank (the whole action of business one performs when visting a bank)

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