Intro to articles발음듣기
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[Voiceover] Grammarians, I would like to tell you a tale of two elephants.발음듣기
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In order to get at the idea of this thing called the article.발음듣기
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We'll explain what that is after I tell you about the elephant and an elephant.발음듣기
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Now articles are words like "a" or an" or the".발음듣기
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Articles are a kind of adjective, some people would call them a determiner, that help you figure out how important something is.발음듣기
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Or how specific something is.발음듣기
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What articles do is they tell you whether or not something is specific.발음듣기
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Are you thinking about any old elephant when you talk about an elephant, or are you thinking about one elephant in particular?발음듣기
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The elephant. And this is the difference.발음듣기
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When we're talking about the elephant we're talking about a specific elephant.발음듣기
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We have particular one in mind.발음듣기
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This what's called the definite.발음듣기
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Because it defines what we're talking about.발음듣기
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You know, this elephant could be the queen of the elephants.발음듣기
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Sometimes, when we make sentences we want to aim for that kind of precision.발음듣기
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We want to be precise.발음듣기
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We want to know exactly what we're talking and who we're talking about and why.발음듣기
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That's a case where you would use the word "the".발음듣기
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Now if you're not being specific.발음듣기
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If you're talking about any old elephant.발음듣기
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An elephant that you're not especially familiar with.발음듣기
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An elephant you haven't introduced before.발음듣기
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You would say "an" elephant, because it's not specific... and it's undefined.발음듣기
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So, grammarians call that an indefinite article.발음듣기
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When you know who and what you are talking about for sure you say "the".발음듣기
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And when you're not sure, you say "a" or an".발음듣기
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So if you knew you were talking about a specific elephant.발음듣기
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Say for example the queen of the elephants. The queen.발음듣기
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As indicated by her royal crown, you would say "the".발음듣기
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And if you were talking about any old elephant?발음듣기
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You'd say "an". You'd use the indefinite article.발음듣기
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We'll cover this more later.발음듣기
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I just wanted to give you an introduction to the idea of what an article is.발음듣기
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So "the" for specific, a" or an" for nonspecific.발음듣기
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You can learn anything, David out.발음듣기
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