Indefinite Articles- are you a fan?

[Conager]

In order not to clutter up a lovely thread on the arbitrary and capricious ordering of the alphabet where I began a digression, I thought I would create a space to discuss this important topic independently.

I said:

I rather like vowels, gives tone and resonance to words. ~snip~ Not to derail this fine thread on a tangent, but I do think that rather than cut back on vowels, necessarily, we consider Russian utility and eliminate I definite articles. They (by definition) define nothing and serve no actual purpose. "The Book," or worse, "A Book" tells us nothing more than grunting "Boook!" and pointing. ~snip~

What say you?

On a related note, how do you feel about excessive use of 'that' in sentences? I find that I use it more than that which is strictly necessary when I am trying to convey <a> tone <that> is less colloquial.

 

[hobbit.]

Some very sound (and not only in the phonetic manner) points are raised, not least about articles - the use of which can be questionable at times.

This promises to be a quality thread.

 

[Conager]

In vein of talk like pirate day, we should game out change with talk like russian man day. Would be made clear such articles are not panacea of utility promised.

 

[Stratothrax]

One of English's advantages over other languages is it is a very precise language with little ambiguity even if it comes at a cost of more words.


If it is a matter of efficiency of communication then I would point out that English is in the top five major languages in the world for communicating information per syllable, English is faster than Spanish, and much much faster than Japanese so it has the room to be more precise.


I do kind of wish it was less precise as an author however, it does get pretty tiresome to write so many repetitive joining words. I have gotten around it a little bit with keyboard macros and auto-completion of words but there is still rather a lot of repetition when it comes to writing.

 

[Conager]

One of English's advantages over other languages is it is a very precise language with little ambiguity even if it comes at a cost of more words.


If it is a matter of efficiency of communication then I would point out that English is in the top five major languages in the world for communicating information per syllable, English is faster than Spanish, and much much faster than Japanese so it has the room to be more precise.


I do kind of wish it was less precise as an author however, it does get pretty tiresome to write so many repetitive joining words. I have gotten around it a little bit with keyboard macros and auto-completion of words but there is still rather a lot of repetition when it comes to writing.

TL;DR

Do you L337, bro?

 

[HisArpy]

<-- The fan of indefinite articles.

 

[Conager]

Fan of indefinite articles disqualified. Lawyerin' pays by word, comrade.

 

[HisArpy]

Fan of indefinite articles disqualified. Lawyerin' pays by word, comrade.

So, is this like I have to spend 2 minutes in THE penalty box?

 

[Conager]

Da!

.

.​

 

[pantalaimonlyra]

The language sounds too hard to my ear without the indefinite articles. Based on that alone, I wouldn't stop using them. We don't want to go full Kevin either.

https://i.redd.it/5a08t91zq2w01.png

 

[Stratothrax]

I just noticed they shaped that guys hair to make his head look like a penis lmao

 

[Conager]

Not even if get to play Natasha Badenov?

http://img2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20140511040437/poohadventures/images/c/cf/Natasha_Fatale.jpg

 

[LupusDei]

Definitive articles obviously have a function. Indefinite, only point it's not definitive, so indeed kind of redundant. I would like to use such only when it's important to point out the difference, when there's a difference.

Well, my native language (Latvian) is, by opinion of some contemporary research linked in the same stem branch Russian is (Proto-Indoeuropean --> Proto-Baltic-Slavic --> Proto-Baltic | Proto-Slavic, where slavic is believed to be more "innovative") and from such we can conclude that Russian did indeed lose distinction between definite and indefinite terms at some point. In Latvian, I believe we have interesting compromise, there's no articles whatsoever, and a naked noun can't convey definitiveness on by itself (although such can be inferred from context) but you are forced to define it as soon you describe the noun with an adjective with inherit gender, count, inflection and definitive/indefinite status from the noun it extends.

for example:

galds = a/the [he] table
zils galds = a blue table
zilais galds = the blue table
zili galdi = some blue tables [indefinitive plural]
zilie galdi = these blue tables [definitive plural]
zilāks galds = a bluer table
zilākais galds = the bluest table
gribu zilāku galdu! = I want a bluer table!
gribu zilāko galdu! = I want the bluest table!
zilam galdam nav kāju ~ no blue table have legs
zilajam galdam nav kāju = that blue table doesn't have legs
...
upe = a/the [she] river
zila upe = a blue river
zilā upe = the blue river
zilā upē = in a blue river
zilajā upē = in that blue river
...
​

 

[Conager]

That's really interesting.

I have noticed it times that nearly accentless, non-native English speakers from various places bring with them "tells" that are artifacts of their mother tongue. Eastern-bloc speakers, now that I look at your posts tend to be very descriptive of things that a native English speaker glosses over.

When we refer to a table, what were saying (which I hadn't ever really realized) is I need to mention that there's a table but which one and what it looks like doesn't matter in the least. "Go help Suzy grab a table from the supply room."