An article is a marker that accompanies the noun and expresses notions such as (non-)specificity and (in)definiteness. Sometimes these notions of specificity and definiteness are summed up in the term 'identifiability'. The formal expression is irrelevant; articles can be free, bound, or marked by suprasegmental markers such as tone. Articles are different from demonstratives in that demonstratives occur in a paradigm of markers that have a clear spatial deictic function. As demonstratives can grammaticalize into definite or specific articles, they form a natural continuum, making it hard to define discrete categories, but to qualify as an article a marker should be used in some cases to express definiteness without also expressing a spatial deictic meaning.
Aiton (ISO 639-3: aio, Glottolog: aito1238)
Coded 1. The definite article is postnominal (Morey 2005:244-245).
mə nan a māt nɛ wā time that minister DEF say ‘Then the minister said.’
Buwal (ISO 639-3: bhs, Glottolog: buwa1243)
Coded 1 (Viljoen 2013: 234–242).
Ma ŋga tekeɗ anta vayay ? mā ŋgā tēkēɗ āntā vájáj REL break calabash DEF who ‘Who broke the calabash?’
Ganda (ISO 639-3:lug, Glottolog: gand1255)
Coded 1. In Ganda, the definite article only occurs with adnominal numerals lower than 5. If a noun is not modified by a numeral lower than five, definiteness is not marked (Crabtree 1902: 149).
a. entebe e-biri chair DEF-two ‘the two chairs’ b. entebe biri chair two ‘two chairs’
Dryer, Matthew S. 2013. Definite articles. In Matthew S. Dryer & Martin Haspelmath (eds), The world atlas of language structures online. Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.
Crabtree, William A. 1902. Elements of Luganda grammar. London: Society for the Promotion of Christian Knowledge.
Morey, Stephen. 2005. The Tai languages of Assam. (Pacific Linguistics, 565.) Canberra: Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, Australian National University.
Viljoen, Melanie Helen. 2013. A grammatical description of the Buwal language. Melbourne: LaTrobe University. (Doctoral dissertation.)
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| 0 | absent | 1374 | |
| 1 | present | 824 | |
| ? | Not known | 205 |
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