The use of 'the' with unique items other than place names

We often use the with 'unique items' (i.e. where there is only one of a

kind). A few examples [> 3.31 for place names]:

Institutions and organizations: the Boy Scouts, the United Nations

Compare items with zero: Congress, Parliament
Historical events, etc.: the French Revolution, the Victorian age.
Ships: the Canberra, the Discovery, the Titanic.

Documents and official titles: the Great Charter, the Queen Political parties: the Conservative Party, the Labour Party Public bodies: the Army, the Government, the Police The press (The is part of the title): The Economist, The New Yorker,

The Spectator, The Times

Note: the press, the radio, the television.

Compare: What's on (the) television? What's on TV?

Items with zero: Life Newsweek, Punch, Time Titles (books, films, etc.: The is part of the title): The Odyssey, The

Graduate Items with zero: Exiles, Jaws
Beliefs: the angels, the Furies, the gods, the saints

Compare God. Muhammed, etc. (proper nouns)

[> 2.13, 3.27],
Climate, etc.: the climate, the temperature, the weather
Species: the dinosaurs, the human race, the reptiles

(Compare: Man developed earlier than people think )

The zero article

3 23 Other references with 'the'

Examples of items with the:

- with superlatives [> 6.28]: It's the worst play I've ever seen

- with musical instruments: Tom plays the piano/the flute/the violinThe is often omitted in references to jazz and rock: This is a 1979 recording with Ellison on bass guitar

- fixed phrases with the the [> 6.27.3]: the sooner the better.

- fixed expressions: do the shopping, make the beds

The zero article

The zero article: summary of 'form' and use

plural countables. 0Girls do better than 0 boysat school

Some people want 0 chipswith everything

uncountables(always singular): 0Butter makes you fat

0 Honesty is the best policy

proper nouns: 0 John lives in 0 London

The use of nouns on their own without an article is so fundamental in English that we should not regard this merely as 'the omission of the article', i.e. as something negative. We should think of the non-use of the article as something positive and give it a name: the zero article,which is usually given the symbol 0.

Abbreviations with zero, often acronyms(i.e. words made from the first letters of other words), include:

Organizations: NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization).

Chemical symbols: H₂O (water).

Acronyms which form 'real words': BASIC (Beginners' All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code); radar (Radio Detection And Ranging).