The article as a meaning-forming operator in the English language Contents: Introduction

Summary for Chapter II
Each square in the section The dog subclass stands for an individual representative of the subclass. If we mean any representative of the subclass, we say, a dog; if we mean a particular (unique) representative of the subclass, we say the dog. It will be obvious that any member can be rendered particular.
A different situation is observed when we deal with the animal class as a whole. Here each big square stands for a subclass: dogs, cats, horses, cows, sheep, whales, dolphins, etc. Each subclass is unique, there is only one such subclass in the animal class. That is, we cannot say any dog subclass. Cf. any dog. We can only say the dog subclass.
The constr uction the dog in The dog is an animal is then the result of the elision of the noun subclass (Cf. The river Thames the Thames vs. the subclass `dog' the dog), and the article the is a reminder of the elision. Functionally, subclass is similar to river in the river Thames and dog is similar to Thames in the same construction, dog and Thames are identifying , or particularizing names. However, the result of the elision may also be a construction in which the identifying name is preceded by the zero article, e.g. the writer Dickens, the continent Europe, the country Italy Dickens, Europe, Italy.
These are proper nouns proper, while those with the definite article are still in the process of development


Conclusion
The problem of article determination has given rise to much controversy; there is much dispute about the status of the article itself and the status of its combination with the noun.
The category of article determination shows, or, determines the relations of the referent of the noun to the other referents of the same class. The article is a determiner, a unit which determines a noun, but unlike other determiners (the lexical means of determination: this, that, some, any, very etc.), it is so general, that it has become a grammatical means of determination in modern English.
Different usages of the definite article were described and the conclusion can be made concerning the definite article usage tendencies in Modern English:
- situational usage of article the is common only in conversation, where participants rely on the context that they share with listeners;
- anaphoric the is common in all registers (appendix 1);
- cataphoric the is heavily concentrated in non-fiction writing; it is associated with complex noun phrases.
This explains why there are many problems connected with article usage in English. Patterns mentioned above can bring the clearness to this issue, stating that they are widely used in different contexts while different circumstances.
In sentence (1) the noun beauty stands for the entity as a whole; in sentence (2 and 3) the nouns courage and beauty refer to an individual manifestation of entities: courage denotes a non-particular, specific manifestation (aspect) and beauty, a particular, specific manifestation of the notion.How important is the article as a semantic determiner? The definite article generally needs the support of the co-text: off the co-text nouns determined by the definite article are semantically ambiguous, e.g. the dog, the robbery of old people.
Does the dog mean a specific particular dog or a particular class? Does the noun robbery mean a specific or a particular manifestation of the entity? We cannot answer the question without recourse to the cotext. Only the indefinite article is an unambiguous marker: it marks the noun as an individual representative or an individual aspect of the entity. However, it cannot tell us whether the noun means a specific or a non-specific individual. The conclusion that we can draw from this analysis is that language often needs more than one signal to realize its meanings, the most powerful signal being the context or the co-text.
Grammatical determination of the noun
The article is generally treated as a marker of the noun - full or partial, e.g. a man, the rich. However, not all nouns are invariably used with the `material' article, e.g. strength. Even countables are not always preceded by the material article, e.g. books. Besides the article, nouns are identified in the sentence by other determiners (pronouns, numerals), prepositions, by the presence of appropriate affixes, their relative position. The role of the article is often secondary, or supplementary. To prove this, compare the texts below: the original and its version in which the nouns have been stripped of the articles:
It was a hot day. The two windows opened upon the distant murmur of London. The burning sun of July danced on the rosy and grey waters of the Thames (J.Galsworthy).
It was hot day. Two windows opened upon distant murmur of London. Burning sun of July danced on rosy and grey waters of Thames
Despite the absence of the articles in the second text, the reader still finds the passage comprehensible from a semantic point of view. The elimination of the definite article from the word-combination two windows only affects the communicative structure of the sentence as compared to the original: the two windows conveys thematic information, while two windows conveys rhematic information. Yet, we should not minimize the role of the article as a noun-marker: the article speeds up the process of identification and, consequently, it speeds up the process of the comprehension of the text.
Informational determination of the noun
“Information is a process of interaction between what is already known or predictable and what is new or unpredictable”. The sentence, which is a unit of information, is a structure made up of two parts: the New and the Given. By Given Information is meant information shared by both the speaker and the addressee: it may be recoverable from the context or familiar to them due to the shared environment. Besides the context, Givenness and Newness can be expressed by the definite and indefinite article, respectively.

Resume
The topic of the course work: "Theoretical and practical aspects of studying the article in modern English." The relevance of this topic is determined by the controversy surrounding the use of articles in the English language. The problem of the determination function of articles is the cause of debate in linguistic science, the status of the article itself and the status of its combination with a noun are widely discussed.
The object of this work is the use of articles (a/an, the, zero article) in the English language on the examples of Jonathan Feuer's novel "Everything is illuminated".
The purpose of the work will determine the place of the article in linguistic science, along with its main function as a noun determiner, based on the main trends in the use of the article, in particular in the novel "Everything is illuminated".
The task of the completed course work was to single out the main trends in the use of articles of the English language, most of which cannot be justified by the general rules of the use of articles.
Uncountable nouns do not much differ from countables as concerns the realization of the category of determination: in the text they may be actualized as representatives of the entities as a whole or an individual manifestation of the entities.
Consider:
1. Beauty is rare.
2. They had a courage that no defeats would crush.
3. Mary's beauty simply paralysed him.