Hello Grace and Fred,
It sounds quite like the German example that I wrote. What is still
interesting about the German article usage is that they often use a
definite article in everyday speech (der or die according to the
gender) before the name of a person, e.g.
DER Peter ist weg. [(The) Peter is away.]
DIE Luise hat sich ein Paar neue Schuhe gekauft. [(The) Luise has
bought herself a new pair of shoes.] etc.
But this is possible only in very colloquial language, among friends,
family members, because it is considered uneducated or slang.
Also when referring to an already mentioned person or thing, when you
would use a personal pronoun (er (he) sie (she) es (it), in the
colloquial speech you can hear der, die, or das according to the
grammatical gender of the person or thing, e.g.
- Ist Peter zu Hause? [Is Peter at home?]
- Nee, DER ist weg. [No hes gone.] Correct sentence would be: Nein,
ER ist weg.
or
- Hast du meinen neuen Opel gesehen? [Have you seen my new Opel?]
- DER ist ja schön! [It is beautiful indeed!] Correct sentence would
be: Er ist ja schön!
etc.
But this is a bit offline from ON. Please read Annikas e-mail on the
same topic, she has the best theory on the konungr konunginn
trouble, so far.
Greetings,
Imre
PS.
To add something further, which really does not have anything to do
with ON, the usage of the definite article in the German has affected
Hungarian Budapest slang, and young people in Budapest can often be
heard saying: a Péter [(the) Péter] or az Éva [(the) Éva]. A
and az are the definite articles in Hungarian. But this is also
improper.
Fred and Grace Hatton <
hatton@...>
>
>
> I can only speak to the use of the article in English, but you can
> definitely say "Labor and management reached an agreement on
benefits."
>
> Some English speakers use an article when saying someone is in the
> hospital, but some do not use it in that instance.
> Grace
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> Fred & Grace Hatton
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