"The Bahamas" is an exception, perhaps because it is plural, much like "the United States". Most countries do not start with "The". For instance, Germany, France, Iran. They happen to be singular. However, I think that most people leave off "The" when referencing United Arab Emirates. Many people say "China" but also "The People's Republic of China." As to "the" before a person, people's names just do not use "the" in singular. However, "The Obamas" in plural refers to the entire family, i.e. the four Obamas living in the White House. For the question of articles used with county names, there appears to be individual convention, but not a rule. Someone who studies English rather than simply living it may come up with a better answer. Good luck, JG

We can only put THE before the names of some countries. For example THE USA or THE UK or the example that you used. Sometimes it's because the full name is The UNITED SATES OF AMERICA. Here The is used in relation with the word "States" and not AMERICA. Same thing with THE People's Republic of China and The United Kingdom. In some cases we use THE when the country has a "plural" name. Like THE Philippines or THE Netherlands. They have "S" at the end of their names, making them sound plural. In some cases, however, it's just used because of tradition.

JG gave a good answer. It's just one of those things you have to know about the names of countries. And it varies in different languages. In German, for example, you use "Die Schweiz" to say Switzerland but we don't use the "the" ourselves in English. But, interestingly enough, people do, colloquially use two forms of the German "the" (der, die) in describing people. Like, for example, "der Paul" but it isn't standard or necessary and many Germans consider it poor grammar. But everyone uses "the" all the time in referring to people in casual conversation. And I have no idea why. There are some things about learning a foreign language you just have to accept because there really is no answer to many questions that pop up.