indefinite article

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English[edit]

English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia

Noun[edit]

indefinite article (plural indefinite articles)

  1. (grammar) A word preceding a noun to indicate that the noun refers to any member of the class of objects named by the noun.
    • 1884, Napoleone Perini, “On the Use of the Indefinite Article”, in An Italian Conversation Grammar, page 98:
      The English Indefinite Article, "a" or "an", is more frequently used that the Italian Indefinite Article, "un", "uno", "una".
    • 1921, Harry Egerton Ford, “Part II. Morphology”, in Modern Provençal Phonology and Morphology:
      In the indefinite article, we must note the plural in i, due to the influence of the plural li of the definite article[.]
    • 2018, Kory Stamper, Word by Word, page 28:
      The main literary dialect of ancient Greek ... has a definite article, but no indefinite article.

Usage notes[edit]

  • In English, this term can be represented as a (before a consonant sound) or an (before a vowel sound) in the singular; in the plural, an indefinite article isn't used at all.

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