James Baquet

    Becky is chatting with her classmate Lily in the common room of their dorm.

    Lily: Hi, Becky. Can you help me with something?

    Becky: Sure! What is it?

    Lily: I’m having some trouble with a, an, and the.

    Becky: Oh, no! These are some of the hardest words to learn in the whole English language!

    Lily: But I’m not going to ask you the “big question” of when to use them. I pretty much know that we should use “a” and “an”—

    Becky: The indefinite articles.

    Lily: When we’re talking about one general thing. And we use the definite article “the” to talk about a specific thing or things.

    Becky: Can you show me by example?

    Lily: Sure. Every single countable noun needs some kind of modifier, like “a house,” “the house,” “my house,” and so on.

    Becky: Right.

    Lily: And when we’re talking about a specific one, we use “the.” So “a president” of any country, but “the president of Bolivia.”

    Becky: Good.

    Lily: In the plural, we can say “presidents of countries,” but when we’re being exact “the presidents of Bolivia and Paraguay.”

    Becky: Great! Of course, remember, there are lots of exceptions that you’ll need to learn one by one. But you have the main idea. So what’s the problem?

    Lily: Two problems, actually. First, I know we’re supposed to use “an” before the vowels — a, e, i, o, and u — and “a” before the other letters, the consonants. So “an apple” but “a lemon.”

    Becky: Yeah?

    Lily: But sometimes it doesn’t work! Like “an hour,” “an MBA,” and “a user.”

    Becky: Oh, I see the problem! When we talk about the vowels and consonants, we mean the sound, not just the spelling.

    Lily: Okay.

    Becky: Although we write “MBA” with an “M,” the first letter is actually pronounced “em.”

    Lily: Oh, I get it now!

    Becky: Some words can be even trickier. In America, we say “an herb” because the “h” is silent, but British people say “a herb” because they pronounce the “h.”

    Lily: This is exactly what I needed! Now, one more question, about “the:” when do we say “thee” and when do we say “thuh?”

    Becky: Good one! It’s similar to the “a versus an” question. We usually say “thee” before vowels — “thee apple, thee orange”— but “thuh” before consonants.

    Lily: Thuh pear, thuh watermelon?

    Becky: That’s right.

    Lily: Perfect!

    Becky: This rule isn’t as absolute as the one about “a” and “an.” You could say “thuh apple,” but when you do, the words would sort of slide together.

    Lily: Yes, I see that. Well, thanks, Becky.