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   ENGLISH_TUTOR      English Tutoring for Students of the Eng      4,347 messages   

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   Message 1,575 of 4,347   
   Ardith Hinton to alexander koryagin   
   Such/Fuel... 2.   
   12 Oct 12 22:42:13   
   
   Hi again, Alexander!  This is a continuation of my previous message to you:   
      
   ak>   BTW, practically all uncounable nouns can be used with   
   ak>   "a" articles when they have a definitive word before   
   ak>   them, that reckons it to this or that group.   
      
      
              While I'd hesitate to say "practically all", Roy has offered a good   
   rule of thumb IMHO.  Expanding on some previous examples:   
      
        1)  When we hear on the news that the price of oil has gone up, we know   
            the reference is to crude oil... AKA petroleum.  Such things can be   
            measured only by weight or by volume & are described as uncountable   
            for that reason.  Less oil, fewer barrels of oil.  Okay.  But if we   
            take a moment to consider while we're washing the dinner dishes how   
            many other types of oil are stored in the kitchen & the bathroom as   
            well as the garage, the workshop, and/or a musician's emergency kit   
            we might well be tempted to take the easy way out by calling all of   
            them "oils" and making a list.  That's what the authors chose to do   
            in the second example I mentioned to Roy.  These people listed only   
            eight varieties which are actually edible, but I know of many more.   
      
        2)  As luck would have it I went to the dentist's office a few days ago   
            & saw a sign in the washroom saying "do not throw paper towel(s) in   
            the toilet".  This particular washroom is available only to him, to   
            his staff, and to his clients... and the guy is a perfectionist.  I   
            understand why even a native speaker of English may be at a loss in   
            such cases.  He buys paper towel(s) in rolls.  Same here.  The kind   
            we buy has perforations, however, making the pieces countable.  The   
            kind he buys come in a continuous roll... i.e. the size of a single   
            portion of paper towel depends on how clever one is at inducing the   
            machine to dispense more than a few inches at a time.  Although the   
            pieces are still countable, the size is much less predictable.  The   
            important issue is that a toilet can be plugged just as easily with   
            numerous small bits of industrial-strength recycled cardboard as by   
            a single large one, and the dentist probably realizes that....  ;-)   
      
      
      
   ak>   A pronoun, for instance:   
      
   ak>   What a sweet honey it is!   
      
      
              With the exception of idiomatic expressions such as "it's raining",   
   however, a pronoun must have an antecedent... so I think what you're asking is   
   whether or not "honey" may be regarded as a countable noun if you're comparing   
   different varieties of honey.  My daughter's initial reaction to this question   
   was the same as mine:  honey is supposed to be sweet, isn't it??  My husband's   
   reaction was that one's perception might vary according to which subspecies of   
   bees made the honey & from which plants they gathered the nectar.  That was my   
   second thought.  Either way, we don't know what's available in Russia....  :-)   
      
      
      
   ak>   Probably we can omit "sweet" and in this case we will   
   ak>   single out our honey, make it special with "a":   
      
      
              You could say "It is [indefinite article + adjective + noun]", with   
   or without the addition of an intensifier, in comparing it to other varieties.   
   AFAIC the indefinite article "a(n)" doesn't make it sound special, but in this   
   context "what" does.  WAR AND PEACE is a Russian novel, one of many such works   
   by various people from various countries... yet what a truly wonderful work it   
   is!  The second clause here is what identifies it as special to *me*....  :-))   
      
      
      
      
   --- timEd/386 1.10.y2k+   
    * Origin: Wits' End, Vancouver CANADA (1:153/716)   

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