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Anonymous Posted 20 years ago
Grammar

Why a "the" here in front of a proper name?

0I saw this sentence. P/S tell me why it can have the "THE" there?02br
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00A person at 00the Market Basket00 with more than 12 items ....0-
  

Top answer

0It looks as though Market Basket is a noun and a particular establishment has chosen capitalise it. This is fine, though it is important to understand that the capitals do not turn the common noun into a proper noun. Being an common noun it still needs a "the" in front of it.

  • 0It looks as though Market Basket is a noun and a particular establishment has chosen capitalise it.
  • This is fine, though it is important to understand that the capitals do not turn the common noun into a proper noun.
  • Being an common noun it still needs a "the" in front of it.
  • 02br 02br 00I hope that is helpful,02br 02br 00- Nick0-
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6 Answers
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0It looks as though Market Basket is a noun and a particular establishment has chosen capitalise it. This is fine, though it is important to understand that the capitals do not turn the common noun into a proper noun. Being an common noun it still needs a "the" in front of it. - I am assuming here that Market Basket is like a "supermarket checkout".02br
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00If Market Bask
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0Here is the context of the word.02br
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01i00Someone cutting him off as the drove. A doctor keeping him waiting -- "My time is valuable too." A person 01u00 at the Market Basket02u00 with more than 12 items in the express line. (This set him raving.)02i02br
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01i00 He took it everywhere he went and read it
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0Thanks Believer,02br
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01i00The Market Basket02i00 is the name of the store, or chain of stores, “The” is actually part of the proper name, though when referring to it we don't usually use a capital letter for "the". If the store was simply called "Market Basket" we would write 01i00waiting in line at Market Basket. 02i02br
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0Nick,02br
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00You said we normally do not use a capital letter for "the" when referring to proper names. Is that a normal practice that we speaking of here? Another question is if "the" is not normally used when being referred, when do we then properly capitalize the "THEs"? Can you give me the examples of some "non-referring" cases?0-
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0Hi, 02br
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00This is normal practice, though there is no hard rule about this sort of thing. 02br
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00As an example, if we think of a pub called "The Queen's Head", "The" is part of its name and it is capitalised whenever the name is written on its own, for example in a list of pubs in a tourist guide, or elsewhere whenever the writer wants to stres
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0 Although General Motors Corporation is insisting their company name should be called without THE, one of seven persons online are calling it "01b00the02b00 General Motors Corporation". On the other hand, Ford's formal name is "the Ford Motor Company", but about a half of the people call the company just as "Ford Motor Company" without THE.02br
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