2:00

It's just a dog. Absolutely.

2:02

And you don't know which dog

2:04

it is, is a random dog.

2:06

A random dog. I could

2:08

say, can you give me a pen,

2:10

please? Yeah. And in that case,

2:13

you're not asking me for a specific pen.

2:15

You just need any pen to write

2:18

something. Or we

2:20

could make a statement, a general statement,

2:22

like a cheetah can run very fast.

2:25

That's right. So we're not

2:28

talking about one random cheetah. We're

2:30

talking about all cheetahs but in

2:32

the singular form. So we're

2:34

talking in general there. So

2:37

here we're looking at general,

2:40

non-specific things. But

2:42

we would use the for

2:44

more specific things. We know which

2:46

one we're talking about. That's right.

2:49

And the is called a definite

2:51

article. So is indefinite.

2:55

The is definite. It means

2:57

we definitely know

2:59

what we're talking about. So

3:02

going back to that dog that you saw

3:04

yesterday, you said, I saw

3:06

a dog yesterday. But

3:08

you could give me more information

3:10

about that dog, speaking specifically about

3:12

that dog and say, the dog

3:14

was cute. That's right. And when

3:16

we say the dog was cute,

3:20

because we've already mentioned the

3:22

dog, we both know now

3:24

which dog we're talking about. It's

3:26

the dog that Josie saw yesterday.

3:28

Yeah. Okay. I could

3:30

also ask you, Mark, did

3:32

you watch the match last night? So we

3:35

perhaps haven't spoken about the

3:38

match yet, but

3:40

we both support the same team. So we

3:42

know which match we're talking about. Yeah. Maybe

3:45

it's a football match or a rugby match.

3:48

And we both like these sports.

3:50

So we know which match it

3:52

is. So when Josie says, did

3:55

you see the match last night?

3:57

I know exactly which match she's

3:59

talking. about. Okay.

4:02

So that's a and

4:05

the for general or

4:07

non-specific and specific

4:10

things. We can

4:12

also use the for things where

4:14

there is only one of

4:16

these things. So the

4:19

sky. That's right. There's

4:22

only one sky. It's the

4:24

sky. Or we could talk about,

4:26

for example, the internet. There's

4:28

one internet. That's right. We

4:31

also say the earth.

4:33

There's one planet called Earth

4:36

or the sun. There's

4:38

one sun for us. And

4:40

similarly, the moon again

4:43

for us. There's only one moon.

4:45

The moon. If we live elsewhere, there

4:47

may be more. Yeah. Maybe we would

4:50

talk about a moon. Yeah. One of

4:52

the moons. Anyway, there's

4:54

another situation where we use a and

4:57

that's for jobs and professions.

4:59

That's right. So I would

5:01

say I'm a teacher or

5:04

he is a doctor and so on.

5:06

Yeah. So we need to use this

5:09

for all jobs and professions. So,

5:11

so far we've talked about singular

5:14

situations. We've used as

5:16

an indefinite article for one

5:18

non-specific or general thing. I

5:21

saw a dog yesterday. We've

5:23

used the as the definite

5:25

article for the specific one

5:27

we're talking about the match. I saw

5:29

the match yesterday and

5:32

we've used the for things where there

5:34

is only one the sky,

5:36

the moon, the sun and

5:38

a for jobs and professions. That's

5:40

right. Let's move on to

5:43

talking about plural things now.

5:46

So the first thing to remember

5:48

is that if we're talking about

5:50

more than one thing, so plural

5:52

things, we never use

5:54

a because a means one.

5:56

Yeah. And this is again, we are

5:59

depending on the depending on which language

6:01

you speak, you may find

6:03

this different because some languages do

6:05

have indefinite articles in the plural.

6:08

Absolutely. Yeah, but not in English.

6:10

Not in English. Okay, so what do

6:13

we use? So

6:15

if we want to talk about something

6:18

non-specific or some things

6:20

which are non-specific because

6:22

it's plural or

6:24

general, we don't use

6:26

an article. We don't use a and

6:29

we don't use the. Okay,

6:31

so for example, Josie, I

6:33

know that you love horror

6:35

films. Exactly. So I

6:37

love horror films. This

6:40

means I love horror films in

6:42

general, all horror films. Okay,

6:44

we're not being specific here. We're not

6:46

saying you love the horror films of

6:49

a particular director.

6:52

We're saying you love all horror films. So

6:54

you love horror films. That's right. I

6:57

could also ask you, Mark, do you have

6:59

pets? Okay, and so there's

7:01

no article in there because we're just

7:03

being general. Do you have pets? I

7:06

don't have pets. Okay, so

7:09

we also don't use

7:12

an article when we're

7:14

talking about non-specific, uncountable

7:17

nouns. Okay,

7:19

that sounds a little complicated. I think

7:21

we need some examples here. Yeah,

7:23

so an uncountable noun is

7:26

something that we don't count. We

7:28

think of it as one mass

7:32

or one lump, one thing

7:34

together. Again, let's have

7:37

an example. Good idea. So

7:39

we say water is

7:41

an uncountable noun because we can't

7:43

count water. It's a liquid. Also

7:47

rice. We don't

7:49

really count the individual tiny

7:52

grains of rice, do we? That

7:55

would take quite a long time. Exactly. I

7:57

guess you could say the same for pasta.

10:00

about which dogs you're talking about.

10:02

Yeah, just like your horror movies.

10:04

Exactly, yeah. What

10:07

about for specific uncountable nouns?

10:10

So, for specific uncountable

10:12

nouns, remember nouns that we

10:15

don't count, they're one mass altogether.

10:18

We talked about the information,

10:21

I need information about the project.

10:23

Good. So, I could say

10:25

the information that you

10:27

gave me is clear. So

10:30

there, we're now being specific about

10:32

that information because we are talking

10:34

about the information that I gave

10:36

to Josie for that project. Absolutely.

10:40

And I could say the water

10:43

that comes from my tap at

10:46

home is delicious. Okay,

10:48

so now we know which water

10:50

Josie's talking about, it's not just

10:52

water, I need water, it's the

10:54

water from her tap is

10:57

delicious. That's right. Okay.

10:59

Okay, I think that was a lot of information

11:01

for today. Let's just review

11:03

the plural situations. Can you give us

11:06

just a summary of the plural situations?

11:08

Good idea. So, when we're talking

11:10

about plural things, we never use

11:12

a. If

11:15

we're talking about non-specific plural

11:17

things, so more than one

11:19

thing, we don't use an

11:21

article. I love horror movies. Do

11:24

you have pets? If

11:26

we're talking about non-specific uncountable

11:29

nouns, we also don't

11:31

use an article. I

11:33

need information. I need water. For

11:36

specific plural things, we use the. The

11:40

horror movies I watched last week, the

11:43

dogs I know. And

11:46

for specific uncountable nouns,

11:49

we also use the. The

11:51

information you gave me, the

11:54

water from my tap. Excellent.

11:57

Lots of information, but hopefully we've.

12:00

We've all understood it now. We

12:07

hope that you've enjoyed this lesson

12:09

about the and a. If

12:12

you'd like to see the examples

12:14

that we've given and more information

12:17

about the and a written down,

12:20

you can have a look at the blog

12:22

post for this lesson. You can

12:24

find the link in the description. If

12:27

you'd like even more help

12:29

with your English, then we

12:31

provide a free email lesson

12:33

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12:35

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12:37

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12:39

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12:42

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and we'll be back next

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week. See you soon. Happy

12:50

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12:58

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13:00

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13:03

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13:06

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