Definiteness

For other uses, seeDefiniteness (disambiguation).

Inlinguistics,definitenessis asemantic featureofnoun phrasesthat distinguishes betweenreferentsorsensesthat are identifiable in a given context (definite noun phrases) and those that are not (indefinite noun phrases). The prototypical definite noun phrase picks out a unique, familiar,specificreferent such asthe sunorAustralia,as opposed to indefinite examples likean ideaorsome fish.

There is considerable variation in the expression of definiteness across languages, and some languages such asJapanesedo not generally mark it, so the same expression can be definite in some contexts and indefinite in others. In other languages, such asEnglish,it is usually marked by the selection ofdeterminer(e.g.,thevs.a). Still other languages, such asDanish,mark definitenessmorphologicallyby changing the noun itself (e.g. Danishenmand(a man),manden(the man)).

Definiteness as a grammatical category

There are times when a grammatically marked definite NP is not in fact identifiable. For example,the polar bear's habitat is the arcticdoes not refer to a unique, familiar,specificbear, in an example of aform-meaning mismatch."The theoretical distinction between grammatical definiteness and cognitive identifiability has the advantage of enabling us to distinguish between a discrete (grammatical) and a non-discrete (cognitive) category."^{[p. 84]}

Use in different languages

English

InEnglish,definiteness is usually marked by the selection ofdeterminer.Certain determiners, such asa,an,many,andsome,along with numbers (e.g.,fouritems), typically mark a noun phrase as indefinite. Others, includingthe,that,andgenitivenoun phrases (e.g.,mybrother) typically mark the noun phrase as definite.

A number of tests have been proposed to distinguish definite from indefinite noun phrases. "Each has a foundation in intuition, as well as some degree of grammatical effect. However, it is not clear that any of them corresponds cleanly to formal categories."

1. If a noun phrase can be put into anexistential clausesuch asthere isnoun phraseat the door(e.g.,there are two wolves at the door), it is likely indefinite.
2. "The concept of identifiability expressed by the definite article is best understood in terms of pre-empting a question withwhich?"

Other languages

• InBasque,definiteness is marked by a phrasal clitic article.

emakume woman emakume woman "woman"

emakume-a woman-ART emakume-a woman-ART "the woman"

emakume woman ederr-a beautiful-ART emakume ederr-a woman beautiful-ART "the beautiful woman"

• InDanish,definiteness is markedmorphologically.
• InRomanian:

om man om man "man"

om-ul man-ART om-ul man-ART "the man"

om-ul man-ART bun good om-ul bun man-ART good "the good man"

or

bun-ul good-ART om man bun-ul om good-ART man "the good man"

• InAlbaniandefiniteness is marked by a noun affix.

djalë djalë "boy"		djal-i djal-ART djal-i djal-ART "the boy"		djal-i djal-ART i i madh madh djal-i i madh djal-ART i madh "the elder son"
vajzë vajzë "girl"		vajz-a vajz-ART vajz-a vajz-ART "the girl"		vajz-a vajz-ART e e bukur bukur vajz-a e bukur vajz-ART e bukur "the pretty girl"

• InArabic,the definite (الـمَعْرِفَة) can be determined from the indefinite (النَّكِرَة) with presence of the definitive articleal-(الـ) or a possessive pronoun suffix forming aniḍāfaconstruction. Adjectives describing definite nouns are also marked with the definitive articleal-(الـ).الكتاب الكبير(al-kitāb al-kabīr) with two instances ofal-(DEF-book-DEF-big, literally, "the book the big" )
• inHungarian,verbs show agreement with the definiteness of their object:

olvasok read-1SG.PRES.INDEF egy a könyvet book-ACC.SG olvasok egy könyvet read-1SG.PRES.INDEF a book-ACC.SG "I read a book"

versus

olvasom read-1SG.PRES.DEF a the könyvet book-ACC.SG olvasom a könyvet read-1SG.PRES.DEF the book-ACC.SG "I read the book"

• Japanese,Tư はBổnを cầm っている(watashi wahono motteiru"I havea/the book"), is ambiguous between definite and indefinite readings.

Germanic,Romance,Celtic,Semitic,andauxiliarylanguages generally have a definite article, often preposed but in some cases postposed. Many other languages do not. Some examples areChinese,Japanese,Finnish,and modernSlavic languagesexceptBulgarianandMacedonian.When necessary, languages of this kind may indicate definiteness by other means such asdemonstratives.

It is common for definiteness to interact with the marking ofcasein certain syntactic contexts. In many languages, adirect objectreceives distinctive marking only if it is definite. For example, inTurkish,the direct object in the sentenceadamı gördüm(meaning "I saw the man" ) is marked with the suffix-ı(indicating definiteness).The absence of the suffix on a direct object in Turkish means that it is indefinite and, in the absence of the indefinite articlebir,no longer explicitly singular:adam gördüm( "I saw a man/I saw men" ).

InSerbo-Croatian,in theBalticlanguagesLatvianandLithuanian,and, to a lesser extent inSlovene,definiteness can be expressed morphologically on prenominal adjectives.The short form of the adjective is interpreted as indefinite, while the long form is definite orspecific:

• short (indefinite): Serbo-Croatiannovgrad"a new city"; Lithuanianbaltaknyga"a white book"; Latvianbaltamāja"a white house"
• long (definite):novigrad"the new city, a certain new city";baltojiknyga"the white book, a certain white book";baltāmāja, with a long vowel"the white house"

In some languages, the definiteness of the object affects thetransitivityof theverb.In the absence of peculiar specificity marking, it also tends to affect thetelicityof mono-occasionalpredications.

In some Scandinavian languages, such asSwedish,definite nouns inflect with a dedicated set of suffixes. This is known in Swedish as the grammatical category ofspecies.

See also

• Construct state
• Article (grammar)
• Topic–comment
• Specificity

Further reading

• Aguilar-Guevara A, Pozas Loyo J, Vázquez-Rojas Maldonado V (eds.). 2019. Definiteness across languages. Berlin: Language Science Press.ISBN978-3-96110-193-1.doi:10.5281/zenodo.3265959.Open Access.http://langsci-press.org/catalog/book/227.
• Hawkins, J.A. (1978)Definiteness and indefiniteness: a study in reference and grammaticality prediction.London:Croom Helm.
• Definitearticle fromGlottopedia

External links

• http:// smg.surrey.ac.uk/features/morphosyntactic/definiteness/doi10.15126/SMG.18/1.06