Articles – Proper Use of ‘The’ in American English

american-englisharticles

I read in a grammar textbook that when people want to talk about general phenomena they shouldn’t use “the”. For example:

They took him to hospital.

Here the speaker doesn’t mean a specific hospital. Then it is mentioned that in American English, “the” is used for general phenomena too. So:

They took him to the hospital.

Here also, the speaker doesn’t mean a specific hospital.

I wonder if it is a general rule in American English? For example which of the following is correct in American English?

I have to be at the airport by 5PM. (Not a specific airport, but the general meaning of airport.)

or

I have to be at airport by 5PM. (Not a specific airport, but the general meaning of airport.)

Best Answer

In American English, we always use a determiner (or the plural) when going to hospitals or airports. The form with "the" is used for both cases where "the" makes sense, because you're talking about a particular one, and for the general sense you asked about: "the hospital", "the airport". So in your examples, you should say "took him to the hospital" and "be at the airport".

I've never heard "go to hospital" or "go to airport" in normal use*. While I could guess what meaning was intended, it doesn't truly have a meaning in my dialect.

When you use a language or dialect idiomatically, you don't always phrase things exactly the way you mean. Sometimes there's a more common phrasing, and you choose to rephrase what you're saying to use that more common phrasing. "The hospital" and "the airport" are phrases like that in American English. Even in cases where "go to a hospital" or "go to an airport" might make more sense, people will choose to say "the hospital" or "the airport".

* There are note-taking and headline-writing registers of American English where articles are commonly dropped out, so in those situations you'd find "go to airport", but that's an abbreviation of "go to the airport".

Related Topic