students often find the rul les for using articles (2°, * s find 5 aban He confusing. This nit focuses onthe eine arid a " provides examples and practice. heand 1 Using articles Unless they are uncountable, all nouns need an article when used in the singular. The article can be either a/an or the, Compare: of borrowing again; (a) The Central Bank has reduced the cost {b) She went to a bank to change some dollars. ank is identified. In (a) a specific f the bank is not important In (b) the name O 2 Practice exercise: The definite article the (he definite aril) are aguite complex. rules for usin it is used. or not ust largest motor manuf unded in the eightee wa eco wh? 4, in the following exameles. ia) THe world's! acturer is General Motors. te) Te usa was fo) nth century.7! Parts Accuracy in wri, 178 {C) The government increased regulation of banks in the 1930s. ‘d) In many companies, the knowledge of most employaes is @ wasted resource. (2) ‘The Economist’is published every week (8) The south is characterised by poverty and emigration. (9) John Maynard Keynes, the British economist, died in 1946. (h) The River Seine runs through the middle of Paris. (i) The World Bank was founded in 1945. () The euro was intraduced in 2002. 3 Use of the definite article In general, the is used with: (a) superlatives (largest) (b) time periods (eighteenth centwr/1930%) (©) unique things Government, world) (A) specified things (tnowledge of mast employees) (©) regular publications (The Economist) (8) regions and rivers (south/River Seine) (g) very well-known people and things (British economist) (h) instirutions and bodies (World Bank) (@) positions (middle) Gj) currencies (enro) It is not used with (k) things in general (banks) (1). names of countries, except for the UK, the USA and a few others (m)abstract nouns, ¢g- inflation (n) companies/things named. after people/places, e.g, Sainsbury Heathrow airportWstig "ites? 33 Articles jowing sentences, decide if the words ang fol s m me ectic ‘or not, and whether ‘the* should be ae Underlined gone inflation wes the greatest problem for ernment —— Brazilian ination was the greatest problem for the Brazilian government 1 engingering is the main industry in onthern region. _ insurance firms have made a record profit in *| —~ financial year 2008-9 ie global warming is partly caused by ______ fossil fuels - y __—sompany’s CEO has been arrested on_ fraud para 4) thet is costing _b of pounds a year. tourism is__ world's biggest industry. — @ forests of Scandinavia produce most of __ Britain's paper. Thai currency is _ baht. computer crime has grown by 200 per cent in last decade. i ____ main causes of ____ industrial revolution are still debated. I Already 3 per cent of _ working population are employed in call centres. rising o latest forecast predicts unemployment for two years- ‘>| Research on____ housing mal —_____ business school. st definition is often ket is being conducted in simplest180 Part 3 Accuracy in writing 5 Practice exercise: Articles ME Comblete the following text by inserting a/an/the for nothing) in each 2p. (Note that in some cases mare than one answer is possible. MICROFINANCE Microfinance is the name given to a system of lending {a)____ money to poor people in (b)___ developing Countries, Pioneered by Mohammad Yunus of (¢) Grameen Bank in (d)__ Bangladesh, it has been claimed that this process allows 5 per cent of the customers to leave (e}____ poverty every year, while almost all the clients pay back (f)___toans on time. itis, however, quite difficult to esearch (g) _ effectiveness of microcredit, because of (hy di borrowers with non-borrowers is unhelpful, since non- tulty of organising a study. Simply comparing borrowers are likely to be less entrepreneurial. Buta recent study by (i) two researchers from MIT, (j) American university, in (k)__ Indian city of Hyderabad, which compared two similar city slums, one with microcredit available and one without, found that (I) process had little significant benefit, with only 20 per cent of loans leading to (m)_ creation of {n) new businesses.‘The need to avoid absolute statements was mentioned in Unit 210 Style. This unit presents more examples of tentative or cautious language, in the form of modal verbs, adverbs and verbs, and practises its use. 1 The use of caution Acautious style is necessary in many arcas of academic writing; Primary products usually have low supply and demand elasticities. Most students find writing exam essays difficult. Wages tend to rise in line with inflation. t include: as where caution is particularly importam 0 eds to be tested, (e.g. in an introduction (3) outlining a hypothesis that needs to be tested, (e.g. in an neous ) discussing the Fas may not be conclusive (b) discussing the results of a study, which may P i ‘© commenting on the work of otber writers ( shi) (4) making predictions (normally with may oF ™ ight)ee 182 Part 3 Accuracy in wri ing 2 Using modals, adverbs and verbs Caution is also needed to avoid ‘making statements that are too simplistic: Marketing is critical to commercial success. Such statements are rarely completely true. There is usually an exception that needs to be considered. Caution can be shown in several Ways: Marketing can be critical to commercial success (modal verb) Marketing is eommonly critical to commercial success (adverb) Marketing tends to be critical to commercial success (verb) WE Complete the table below with more examples. Modals Adverbs. | Verb/phrase can commonly tends to 3 Practice exercise: Caution IM Rewrite the following sentences in a more cautious way, (a) Private companies are more efficient than state-owned businesses, (b) Workers prefer pay cuts to redundancy, (c) Older students perform better at university than younger ones. (d) Word-of-mouth is the best kind of advertising, {e) English pronunciation is confusing.18 3-4 Cautior sptroducing new models of Products helps to increase sal 0 3 sales Gjoval warming will USE the Sea level tris, i mnost shopping will be done on the internet inten years i ® ts" time, _ ractice exercise: Caution pote way to express caution fs 0.WSe quite, rather or Fain before an adjetive ‘fairly accurate summary quite a significant correlation rather inconvenient location NB. quite is often used before the article. It is generally used positively, & write rather tends t0 be used negatively In Insert auite/rather/fairly in the following to emohasise caution, {a] The company's efforts to save energy were successful. (b) The survey was a comprehensive study of student opinion. {¢) His second book had a hostile reception {d) The first year students were fascinated by her lectures. {e) The decision to invest the pension fund in commercial property was disastrous. 5 Caution in verbs When referring to sources, the verb used indicates the degree of caution Appropriate. Compare Tilic (200) states that the cost of living ... (positive) Lee (2007) suggests that more research is needed .. (cautious) Other verbs that imply tentative or cautious findings are: think / consider / hypothesise / believe | claim / presume > Sce Unit 3.14 Verbs of reference184 part 3 Accuracy in writing 6 Practice exercise: Caution IE Rewrite the fallow text in @ more cautious ste. One way to confront the threat of global warming 'S for governments to encourage ‘green’ industries with subsidies. By encouraging investment in wind or solar POwet, not only will carbon emissions be reduced, but more jobs will be created. Therefore two problems will be solved at the same time: unemployment and CO; production. Itis caleulated that spending on environmental technology will grow by § per cent 2 year until 2020. By then hundreds of millions of people worldwide will be working in recyeling and carbon-neutral energy projects, and the danger of global warming will be significantly reduced. |