Articles

Articles

There are only three articles in English: a, an, and the. You can also use no article (-).

Articles are a type of determiner. Remember that determiners go before nouns. You can only use one determiner before each noun.

You can think of the articles as going from very general to very specific, in this order:

No article (very general)

A / An (general)

The (specific)

NOTE: A and An are the same thing. We use a when the next word starts with a consonant and an when the next word starts with a vowel.

General Usage:

No article (the noun in general):

Books are for reading. [Talking about books in general.]

A / An (any of the noun)

Read a book. [Talking about any book.]

The (specific one of the noun)

You should read the book Moby-Dick. [Talking about a specific book.]

Don’t use a / an with uncountable nouns. 

Can I have a money?

I am breathing an air.

Use a / an when you talk about something the first time. Once it is understood, use the. 

My dad just got a dog. The dog’s name is Tim.

Don’t use any article to talk about something very generally. 

Air is needed to live.

Dogs bark.

This is also true for institutions (a large important organization that has a particular purpose, for example a university or bank).

We say:

I’m in school.

to talk about being a student, and:

I’m in a school.

to talk about being in the actual building.

The same is true for: prison, jail, church, hospital, and university.

Geography

Countries: if a country has a political title in its name we usually use the. 

the United States of America

the United Kingdom

the Kingdom of Cambodia

Otherwise, use no article:

America

England

Cambodia

If the country is a group of islands, we also usually use the.

the Phillipines

the Bahamas

the Solomon Islands

There are exceptions to these rules, most notably:

the Netherlands

Indonesia

We don’t use the with any continent:

Asia

Africa

Antarctica

Australia

Europe

North America

South America

We don’t use the with most lakes and mountains. 

Tonlé Sap

Superior

Victoria

Mt. Everest

Phnom Aural

But, we do use the with mountain ranges:

the Cardamom Mountains

the Himalayas

the Rocky Mountains

the Dâmrei Mountains

We also use the with rivers:

the Mekong River

the Bassac River

the Nile River

Seas:

the Caspian Sea

the Dead Sea

the Black Sea

Deserts:

the Sahara Desert

the Arabian Desert

the Antarctic Desert