Zero articles

Hi guys, my name’s Dan for BBC learning English in front of the BBC which is filmed at Broadcasting House.

This lesson we’re going to look at zero articles, that is when we don’t use ‘a’, ‘an’ or ‘the’ in front of a noun in English and as usual I’m going to all in 90 seconds. Are you ready? Here we go.

Rule number one: we don’t use an article when talking in general about plural or uncountable nouns. For example:

Life is so hard for English teachers !

When I’m talking about life and English teachers I mean all life and all English teachers. It’s a generalisation, OK?

Rule number two: we don’t use an article when referring to proper nouns, that is a noun that has a specific name. Do you remember I mentioned Broadcasting House ? Broadcasting House is the name of the building and I don’t use an article.

Last holiday I sailed across Lake Victoria , I saw Niagara Falls, I climbed Mount Everest , I went to London at Christmas , I walked down Oxford Street , saw Imperial College and went to Great Ormond Street Hospital.

Now there is a long list of these types of nouns that don’t use an article in English and they include: lakes, islands, beaches, mountains, streets, hospitals, stadiums, parks, churches, temples, universities, religions, days of the week, months, holidays and of course, people like me. Blimey.

Rule number three: we don’t use an article when referring to certain times, for example:

Ghosts come out at night , today was lovely thank you, I’ll see you tomorrow or I think I took a shower last week .

Now for more information on this and other types of English grammar, please check out bbclearningenglish.com. I’ve been Dan, you’ve been fantastic and that, is perfect timing. Bye guys.