[Multilingual Monday] The Definitive, and More Direction!

[aadroma]

Today's topic is about "the definitive", often marked in languages with an article. In English this is "the", a word that originally masculine nominative of se, "that". Several may adjust themselves to phonetic needs -- Hungarian definite pronoun use mirrors the "a/an" use in English, where nouns with a consonant get a and those starting with a

Comments

[gorkabear]

I can answer about basque! One of my best friends is a spanish-basque translator and I made the same question. Basically, you don't use the a/ak suffixes, which can be considered the article, if you use a numeral.

Let's go to a bar... I want two beers: "Garagardo bi, mesedez!"
But the list at the bar will say "Garagardoa .... 3 EUROAK"

Cool, isn't it?

[playfulcub]

I'm amazed.

[bouncercub81]

Yet another reminder that for language, context is just so important ^_^

[torsvan]

In Swedish, there is the plural form too...

example: Girl = flicka
the girl = flickan

girls = flickor
The girls = flickorna

[tisoi]

Tagalog has articles, but they are used differently (of course...) in European languages - "ang lalaki" (the man). There is also an article for names. Si Juan (singular). Sina Juan (plural - Juan and company)

A related language, Waray-Waray (spoken in Samar & Leyte), takes it a step further.

an lalaki (the man - used to refer to one in the past. Also used to refer to a man that's known to the addressee)
it lalaki (the man - used to refer to a man in the future or present. Also used to refer to someone the addresse may not know)
in lalaki (indefinite)