Bog'liq English Grammar- A Resource Book for Students
Definite and indefinite determiners This distinction is somewhat problematic. First, these two groups are really rather
different in referential terms. While the definite determiners (typically the, possessives
and demonstratives) can clearly be said to ‘determine’ the noun group by referring
to something familiar, established or identifiable in the listener/reader’s consciousness,
the indefinite determiners (typically a/an and the so-called ‘quantifiers’) only do
so in a vague way, as Ducrot and Todorov point out (1981:253). This explains why
Jespersen (1933) calls the indefinite article the ‘article of incomplete determination’.
Second, while the distinction between definiteness and indefiniteness can help
to understand the difference in meaning between certain pairs of words, such as the and a/an, and which and what, the borderline is not always clear. Both, for example
is usually grouped with indefinite determiners, but it undoubtedly has an idea of
definiteness; it refers to something in the text or the environment that is familiar, or
established in the mind of the reader or listener. That is why both and both the mean
the same thing.
