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Anonymous Posted 19 years ago
Grammar

For once and for all, can someone explain what determiners are??

I've read many textbooks, done a lot of searches and I have yet to find a suitable answer to my question. Can a knowledgable grammarian please answer this question. What are determiners?

I took this part from a textbook....

There are about 50 different determiners in the English language they include:

  • Articles: a, an, the
  • Demonstratives: this, that, these, those, which etc.
  • Possessives: my, your, our, their, his, hers, whose, my friend's, our friends', etc.
  • Quantifiers:few, a few, many, much, each, every, some, any etc.
  • Numbers: one, two, three, twenty, forty
  • Ordinals: first, second, 1st 2nd, 3rd, last, next, etc.


    • Are they saying there are 50 different determiners including these six > articles/demonstratives/possessives/quantifiers/numbers/ordinals

    Or are they saying altogether there are 50 determiners like this > a, an, the, this, that, these, those, which, my, your, our, their, his, hers, whose, my friend's, our friends' etc....

    I think it's the first case but I need clarrification from someone Emotion: stick out tongue
  

Top answer

Well, the excerpt you have posted is not very well thought through. Possessives here are obviously an open class-- my friend's, John's, Mary's, my dog's, his aardvark's , ad infinitum-- as are cardinal and ordinal numbers-- eight-hundred-and-forty-first, eight-hundred-and-forty-second .... However, possessive nouns ( my friend's , etc) are not normally included among determiners, which are usually restricted to the finite pronouns: my, your, his, her, its, our, their, one's and whose .

— Mister Micawber

  • Well, the excerpt you have posted is not very well thought through.
  • Possessives here are obviously an open class-- my friend's, John's, Mary's, my dog's, his aardvark's , ad infinitum-- as are cardinal and ordinal numbers-- eight-hundred-and-forty-first, eight-hundred-and-forty-second ....
  • However, possessive nouns ( my friend's , etc) are not normally included among determiners, which are usually restricted to the finite pronouns: my, your, his, her, its, our, their, one's and whose .
  • I would also guess that some grammarians consider the numbers separately-- when they are called post-determiners.
  • That would bring us to a closed class of about 50 determiners-- 3 articles, 4 demonstratives, a few interrogative/relatives ( which , etc), 9 possessive pronouns, and a finite list of quantifiers and miscellania.
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1 Answers
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Well, the excerpt you have posted is not very well thought through. Possessives here are obviously an open class-- my friend's, John's, Mary's, my dog's, his aardvark's, ad infinitum-- as are cardinal and ordinal numbers-- eight-hundred-and-forty-first, eight-hundred-and-forty-second....

However, possessive nouns (my friend's, etc) are not normally included among det
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