A hotel or an hotel ... how to master indefinite articles
As every English speaker knows, if a noun or adjective begins with a vowel then we use an as the indefinite article, otherwise we use a.
A banana
An apple
A child
An orphan
Simple right?
But what about the letter H? Is it a hotel or an hotel? An honest man or a honest man?
And why do we say a unicorn when it begins with a vowel or an FBA agent when that starts with a consonant?
It turns out that an before a vowel is not a very good rule for learning English at all :(
Like most rules you learn in English, an before a vowel works most of the time.
And just like most rules you learn in English, it only works most of the time because the person explaining the rule to you probably misunderstood it.
Or at least what a vowel really is.
As a beginner English speaker, you've probably already learnt that the vowels of English are A, E, I, O, and U.
And sometimes Y ... as in fly, sky, or hymn.
But usually not Y ... as in young, you, and yak.
And sometimes W ... as in dew, straw, and awe.
But mostly not W ... as in whale, wave, and witch.
It's clear as mud really.
It doesn't need to be this hard.
The confusion about an before a vowel stems from confusions about what vowels are (or can be).
And just like the confusion about whether a tomato is a fruit or a vegitable, the confusion about vowels comes from different definitions.
One way linguists distinguish vowels from consonants is based on their sound.
According to this definition, vowels are sounds that are created from an open vocal tract that escapes via the mouth.
Consonants on the other hand, have some sort of stricture or blockage of the vocal tract or escape via the nose.
Another way to define vowels however, is base on what they do. According to this other definitino, vowels are the open sounded centre of a syllable.
Defining vowels this way is what makes the letter y a vowel in words like fly or sky.
So the first definition is all about what things sound like. The second definition is about what sounds do. They are similar but different.
Most of the time these two definitions lead to the exact same result. Most of the time, there is no confusion.
But the problem arises when one letter can have both vowel and consonant sounds.
Luckily, our problems go away when we update our rule to focus on sounds. Let's try this ...
An before any word that starts with a vowel sound.
The letter M for example, is a consonant. Sounding M out produces the sound /mm/. Milk, mother, mad etc.
But reading the letter M out loud produces the sound /em/ which starts with a vowel sound. The same sound as emotion or empathy.
With this new rule, we can now understand why we say the following ..
A masters degree ... the /ma/ sound
An MBA ... the /em/ sound
A unique experience... the /yoo/ sound
An unmitigated disaster ... the /un/ sound
A herb ... the /hu/ sound if you speak English
An herb ... the /er/ sound if you are American
There's only one last problem we need to deal with. This is English remember, nothing is ever straight forward.
Is it an historic day or a historic day?
Well, both are acceptable but you will find an historic more common in accents that only gently stress the /h/.
So the choice between a or an comes down to one thing ... sound.
The only reason there is a choice between a or an is to make the flow of a sentence smoother.
So it doesn't matter what the leading letter is, if it sounds smoother to say an than a when the words flow together, then do so.
Simple eh?
