Sato Ryohei
In this sentence, do we need “the”? I found a sentence in a textbook. These are pictures that my friend sent me from Canada. I’m wondering that we need “the” before pictures or not. Thank you for your help in advance.
Jul 31, 2019 3:03 AM
Answers · 5
The answers depend on what has been said before. If you already mentioned that your friend was going to send some pictures, you would introduce them as "the pictures". You would speak of them as "the pictures", the specific ones you mentioned before. If you were talking about unrelated things and then, casually, just happened to take out some pictures to show, you would say these are "pictures". You would speak of them as "pictures" because they are not specific to your previous conversation. I hope this helps
July 31, 2019
We often say "some pictures" to distinguish the difference already mentioned. Whether you knew they were coming or had just arrived as discussed and explained in the answer. "these are (some) pictures my friend sent me From Canada" versus "these are the pictures my friend sent me from Canada"
July 31, 2019
Thank you for a clear explanation. The sentence was from a speech and a person was going to talk about the pictures. So the person didn’t mention the pictures. So the sentence was correct.
July 31, 2019
You would use "the" if the pictures had been talked about before. Since it sounds like they're just now being introduced, "the" wouldn't make sense because the reader wouldn't have known about them.
July 31, 2019
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