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Adrian71 Posted 12 years ago
Grammar
Nationality nouns
We can talk about nations like: Americans or the Americans or the American people...etc. I have reacently read an article where the author switched all the way through from "Poles" to "the Poles" in the context of World War 2. I gues the Poles means the Polish nation and Poles means any Poles/some Poles. Am I right? but I don't get it completely....
Please help me and provide any ideas how a native English speaker understands POLES versus THE POLES in any context. Thank you in advance.
Please help me and provide any ideas how a native English speaker understands POLES versus THE POLES in any context. Thank you in advance.
Top answer
We use Americans/the Americans interchangeably in these cases.
- We use Americans/the Americans interchangeably in these cases.
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5 Answers
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The only difference is the definite article, the.
In general statements, we do not use "the"
Americans like football.
Americans like to go on cruises.
Frenchmen like good food and wine
Poles like football.
Germans are crazy about football.
Italians eat a lot of pasta.
We use "the" when speaking of specific, not general things.
The Poles fought
In general statements, we do not use "the"
Americans like football.
Americans like to go on cruises.
Frenchmen like good food and wine
Poles like football.
Germans are crazy about football.
Italians eat a lot of pasta.
We use "the" when speaking of specific, not general things.
The Poles fought
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Adrian71I gues the Poles means the Polish nation and Poles means any Poles/some Poles. Am I right?More or less, yes. I agree with Alphecca that it depends on how general the statement is. For the most general statements, "the" is omitted. Then the reference is to any and/or every Pole, American, German, or whatever. For more specific actions, "the" is oft
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Poles has several meanings:
There are the Poles from Poland, who speak Polish (not to be confused with the polish that you need to do to get a shine on your wooden table/furniture polish - the difference is the 'o' and the stress)
The negative and positive ends of batteries / plus pole, minus pole
the North Pole and the South Pole
A telegraph pole (a sort of mast for hanging teleph
There are the Poles from Poland, who speak Polish (not to be confused with the polish that you need to do to get a shine on your wooden table/furniture polish - the difference is the 'o' and the stress)
The negative and positive ends of batteries / plus pole, minus pole
the North Pole and the South Pole
A telegraph pole (a sort of mast for hanging teleph
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In English, it is exceedingly common for one word to have many meanings and even parts of speech.
But the word "Poles" has only one possible meaning. In other instances, the word is not capitalized, and there is only one geographical location, North Pole.
But the word "Poles" has only one possible meaning. In other instances, the word is not capitalized, and there is only one geographical location, North Pole.
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