Article before a common noun:
The cow— a particular cow.
A cow— any cow.
Cows.—all of them.
But while reading an essay on cow, we usually get to see:
The cow is a very useful domestic animal.
In my opinion I should be:
Cows are very useful domestic animals.
And the title should be Cows instead of The cow.
Please help.
Thank you.
Best Answer
This is a special usage of the word "the". It is listed in the MacMillan Dictionary under definition #2 as follows,
"used before a singular noun when making a general statement about people or things of a particular type"
They give two examples:
Used in this way, "the + singular noun" means basically the same thing as that same noun pluralized:
This construction is very common in titles and introductory sentences within paragraphs and chapters because it has a certain air of scholarliness about it that the simple plural form just doesn't convey.