A/an, plurals – singular and plural forms

What is an article?

Basically, articles are either definite or indefinite. They combine to a noun to indicate the type of reference being made by the noun.

• The definite article is the.
• The indefinite article is a / an.

The indefinite article a or an:

The article a / an is used when we don’t specify the things or people we are talking about:

• I met a friend.
• I work in a factory in New York.
• I borrowed a pencil from a passenger sitting next to me.

The indefinite article a is used before a consonant sound:

• a dog.
• a pilot
• a teacher.
• a university

NOTE:
Although ‘university’ starts with the vowel ‘u’, it is not pronounced as such. It is pronounced as a consonant sound /ju:.niv3:.si.ti/

The indefinite article an is used before a vowel sound:

• an engineer.
• an elephant.
• an athlete

The definite article the:

It’s used when the speaker talks about a specific object that both the person speaking and the listener know.

• The car over there is fast.
• The president of the United States is giving a speech tonight.

When we speak of something or someone for the first time we use a or an, the next time we repeat that object we use the definite article the.

• I live in a house. The house is quite old and has four bedrooms.
• I ate in a Chinese restaurant. The restaurant was very good.

No article:

1. Do not use an article with countries, states, counties or provinces, lakes and mountains except when the country is a collection of states such as “The United States”.

• He lives in Washington near Mount Rainier.
• They live in Northern British Columbia.
• They climbed Mount Everest.

2. we do not normally use an article with plurals and uncountable nouns to talk about things in general.:

• He writes books.
• She likes sweets.
• Do you like jazz music?
• She ate bread with butter in the morning.

Countable and uncountable nouns

Using English articles with countable and uncountable nouns may be confusing.

The can be used with uncountable nouns, or the article can be dropped entirely as mentioned above.

1. “The two countries reached the peace after a long disastrous war” (some specific peace treaty) or “The two countries reached peace after a long disastrous war” (any peace).
2. “He drank the water” (some specific water- for example, the water his wife brought him from the kitchen) or “He drank water.” (any water)

It is unusual to use a/an for uncountable nouns. You can’t say “I’d like a milk“

a/an can be used only with countable nouns.

1. I’d like a piece of cake.
2. I lent him a book.
3. I drank a cup of tea.

English plural nouns

In order to change a singular noun to its plural form in English, you usually add “s”. For example, the plural of book is books. The plural of table is tables. These are regular plurals.

But there are many nouns which don’t follow this rule. For example the plural of fish is fish. The plural of tooth is teeth. These are irregular plurals

Regular plurals:

Form:

Add “s” to the noun:

Noun	+ S

While many plural nouns follow this rule, the spelling sometimes differ.

Examples:

Singular	Plural
snake	snakes
window	windows
box	boxes
boy	boys
lorry	lorries
potato	potatoes
knife	knives

Spelling of plurals:

The plural form of most nouns is created simply by adding the letter “s”.

• more than one snake = snakes
• more than one girl = girls
• more than one window = windows

Nouns that end in -ch, x, s, z or s-like sounds, however, will require an es for the plural:

• more than one witch = witches
• more than one box = boxes
• more than one gas = gases
• more than one bus = buses
• more than one kiss = kisses

Nouns that end in a vowel + y take the letter s:

• more than one boy = boys
• more than one way = ways

Nouns that end in a consonant + y drop the y and take ies:

• more than one baby = babies
• more than one lorry = lorries

A lot of nouns that end in o take es in the plural:

• more than one potato = potatoes
• more than one hero = heroes

o becomes oes
echo	echoes
embargo	embargoes
hero	heroes
potato	potatoes
tomato	tomatoes
torpedo	torpedoes
veto	vetoes

Some nouns ending in o break the above rule and get os in the plural form:

o becomes os
auto	autos
kangaroo	kangaroos
kilo	kilos
memo	memos
photo	photos
piano	pianos
pimento	pimentos
pro	pros
solo	solos
soprano	sopranos
studio	studios
tattoo	tattoos
video	videos
zoo	zoos

Other nouns ending in o get either os or oes i the plural forms:

o becomes os or oes
buffalo	buffalos/buffaloes
cargo	cargos/cargoes
halo	halos/haloes
mosquito	mosquitos/mosquitoes
motto	mottos/mottoes
no	nos/noes
tornado	tornados/tornadoes
volcano	volcanos/volcanoes
zero	zeros/zeroes

Plurals of nouns that end in f or fe usually change the f sound to a v sound and add s or -es.

• more than one knife = knives
• more than one leaf = leaves
• more than one hoof = hooves
• more than one life = lives
• more than one self = selves
• more than one elf = elves

Irregular plurals:

There are several nouns that have irregular plural forms.

Singular	Plural
fish	fish
sheep	sheep
barracks	barracks
foot	feet
tooth	teeth
goose	geese
tooth	teeth
goose	geese
child	children
man	men
woman	women
person	people
mouse	mice

Plurals formed in this way are sometimes called irregular plurals or mutated (or mutating) plurals.

• more than one child = children
• more than one woman = women
• more than one man = men
• more than one person = people
• more than one goose = geese
• more than one mouse = mice
• more than one barracks = barracks
• more than one deer = deer

Other irregular plural forms include the following:

Some foreign nouns retain their plural. (Note that some of them adapted the s of the English plural form!)

Singular	Foreign plural	English plural
alga	algae
amoeba	amoebae	amoebas
antenna	antennae	antennas
formula	formulae	formulas
larva	larvae
nebula	nebulae	nebulas
vertebra	vertebrae

Nouns ending in us get a, i or the s of the English plural:

Singular	Foreign plural	English plural
corpus	corpora
genus	genera
alumnus	alumni
bacillus	bacilli
cactus	cacti	cactuses
focus	foci
fungus	fungi	funguses
nucleus	nuclei
octopus	octopi	octopuses
radius	radii
stimulus	stimuli
syllabus	syllabi	syllabuses
terminus	termini

Nouns ending in um get a, i or the s of the English plural:

Singular	Foreign plural	English plural
addendum	addenda
bacterium	bacteria
curriculum	curricula	curriculums
datum	data
erratum	errata
medium	media
memorandum	memoranda	memorandums
ovum	ova
stratum	strata
symposium	symposia	symposiums

Nouns ending in ex or ix get ices or get the s of the English plural:

Singular	Foreign plural	English plural
apex	apices	apexes
appendix	appendices	appendixes
cervix	cervices	cervixes
index	indices	indexes
matrix	matrices	matrixes
vortex	vortices

Nouns ending in is becoming es in plural:

Singular	Plural form
analysis	analyses
axis	axes
basis	bases
crisis	crises
diagnosis	diagnoses
emphasis	emphases
hypothesis	hypotheses
neurosis	neuroses
oasis	oases
parenthesis	parentheses
synopsis	synopses
thesis	theses

Nouns ending in -on becoming -a:

singular	plural
criterion	criteria
phenomenon	phenomena
automaton	automata

Nouns that are always singular:

A handful of nouns appear to be plural in form but take a singular verb:

• The news is bad.
• Gymnastics is fun to watch.
• Economics/mathematics/statistics is said to be difficult.

Some nouns never take the s of the plural and are always singular:

• your luggage / baggage is so heavy
• I’d like to buy new furniture for the house
• you can find more information in our website.

Exercises on the theme: