Why did author use a different sort of articles in sentence, which describe a picture?

Question

I am not a native speaker. I am doing a exercise "*Answer the questions about the pictures*" from my Grammar Book and I checked Keys at end of the book: I saw: > - In A **the** man is lying on **the** floor. In B he is standing on **the** chair. > - In A **the** woman is writing (**a** letter). In B she is reading **a** book. > - In A **the** man is running. In B he is riding **a** bicycle. > - In A **the** woman is driving (**the** car). In B **the** man is driving (**the** car). I know, that the article "the" indicates that I am referring to a specific instance. Could you please explain for me: Why did author use indefinite and definite articles? Why did author see a difference between phrases: "a bicycle"(indefinite article) and "the car" (definite article), "the chair"(definite) and "a book" (indefinite)?

Answer 1

Think of it this way...

The word "the" is a definite article. It is referring to a specific one.

The word "a" could be any one of those objects. Which can be a little confusing in your second example.

The man is lying on the floor.

The important idea is to think about the intent of the speaker or writer. If you say "the" man, it is implied that the listener knows which man. It is important that this message is about him, not just any man. The article "the" in "lying on the floor," means it is a specific floor and the listener knows which one.

If this were changed to, "A man is lying on a floor," it means that somewhere in the world, some man is lying on some floor. No specifics are known or are important to what I am saying.

He is standing on the chair.

Same as above. It is a particular chair and the listener understands which one.

The woman is writing a letter

The first word, "the" refers to a particular woman. We want the other person to know we don't just mean any woman. It is specifically the one we are looking at or where previously talking about.

Then, the word "a" is used in front of " letter". This means that as far as our conversation goes, it is not necessary for us to know specifically what letter she is writing. The fact that what she is doing is writing a letter is what is important,

She is reading a book.

Due to the use of the indefinite article, which book is not important to our conversation, and we may not even know which book. The important message is tell what she is doing. The important message of the speaker or writer is what action the person is doing.

The man is running. He is riding a bicycle.

In the above, we are referring to a specific man. Details about which bike he is riding are irrelevant in our conversation. If we say "the bike," it means we are talking about a particular bike. For example, maybe we were talking out a really old bike you lent him. That would be "the bike."

The woman is driving the car. The man is driving the car.

As you catch on to the idea, you understand that we are talking about two particular people. It doesn't mean we have to know everything about them, but these particular people are relevant to our conversation. The fact that they are driving "the" car means that the speaker refers to a specific car, such as the one in the picture.

I hope this makes sense! Please send any questions and I will try to answer!

Answer 2

The car refers to a specific car. A car can be any car or 1 of more than 1 car. If the author used the phrase a car when referring the picture in your book, was there more than 1 car or more than one thing in the picture? If so, this is why he said a car.

Answer 3

Hi Erich,

This is not an easy question, and my unfortunate best answer is practice. Keep reading and listening to English, and eventually you should start to internalize the patterns.

I can also say that you definitely have the right idea. The inconsistencies you notice are--I think--because in such simple examples, there really isn't much difference between "the man is riding a bicycle" and "the woman is driving the car." You are absolutely correct to notice that there is nothing more specific about the woman's car than there is about the man's bicycle.

Maybe if the picture shows several bicycles, then "the man is riding a bicycle" might make more sense than "the bicycle," because otherwise you would want to say which one. For example, if all the bicycles are different colors, "the man is riding the blue bicycle," but if there are several blue bicycles, then "the man is riding a blue bicycle." But if not, then there isn't enough context to say which one you should use.

The general idea is to think about how much we know about the object or person. "*The* man..." because it's the man in the picture, not any man. "...is writing *a* letter," because we don't know anything about the letter he's writing. Even if we know the content, it would probably still be "a" because while he is writing it, or while he wrote it, it's kind of like the *idea* of a letter, and still not specific. So:

"The man is writing a love letter."

"The man is writing a letter to Santa Claus asking for a bicycle, a puppy, and toy soldiers."

"The man wrote a letter to explain why he wrote so many letters."

In all of these, there are an infinite number of possible letters that fit those descriptions.

BUT

"The man is writing a letter. *The* letter asks Santa for new toys."

and

"The man is writing *the* letter that his mother told him to write."

Now the letters are specific.

But all of that is probably way too confusing and complicated to think about every time you want to say something. It took me a while to think about too. So, I'm ending on the first answer I gave, which is: keep reading and listening, and eventually you'll get it. And also, some of the answers in your book are arbitrarily rigid.