2018 – 2020 (1)

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING
HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY

ENGLISH LANGUAGE

M.A. THESIS
DETERMINERS IN ENGLISH NOUN
PHRASES AND THEIR VIETNAMESE
TRANSLATION IN THE WORK
“THE GREAT GATSBY”
(Từ hạn định trong cụm danh từ tiếng Anh
và cách dịch của chúng sang tiếng Việt trong
tác phẩm “Gatsby vĩ đại”)

CHU THỊ HẠNG

CHU THỊ HẠNH
Field: English Language
Code: 8.22.02.01

Hanoi – 2020

i


MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND TRAINING
HANOI OPEN UNIVERSITY

M.A THESIS

DETERMINERS IN ENGLISH NOUN
PHRASES AND THEIR VIETNAMESE
TRANSLATION IN THE WORK
“THE GREAT GATSBY”
(Từ hạn định trong cụm danh từ tiếng Anh
và cách dịch của chúng sang tiếng Việt trong
tác phẩm “Gatsby vĩ đại”)
CHU THỊ HẠNH
Field: English Language
Code: 8.22.02.01
Supervisor: Dr. Dang Ngoc Huong
Hanoi, 8/2020

ii


CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY
I, the undersigned, hereby certify my authority of the study project report entitled
“Determiners in English noun phrases and their Vietnamese translation in the work
“The Great Gatsby” submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the
degree of Master in English Language. Except where the reference is indicated, no
other person’s work has been used without due acknowledgement in the text of the
thesis.
Hanoi, 2020

Chu Thị Hạnh

Approved by
SUPERVISOR


Dr. Dang Ngoc Huong

Date: 4/7/2020

iii


ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
First of all, I would like to show my sincere gratitude to Dr. Dang Ngoc
Huong, my supervisor who has given me the inspiring and invaluable guidance,
advice, encouragement and instructions during the preparation as well as the
correction of this study, and everything that I learnt from him throughout my work.
Without him, this thesis would not have been possible. I would like to express my
special thanks to Prof. Dr Hoang Tuyet Minh for her help and encouragement.
My thanks are also sent to all other lecturers and the staff of the Faculty of
Post Graduate Studies at Hanoi Open University for their helpful lectures, assistance
and enthusiasm during my course .
Special acknowledgement is also given to my lecturers at Hanoi Open
University for their precious knowledge, useful lectures in linguistics, which lay the
foundation for this study
Finally I am also indebted to my family, my colleagues and friends who
always support and encourage me a lot.
Because of my limited experience, it is invitable to have mistakes in this
study, so I hope to be overlooked. Thank you!

Hai phong, May 2020
Chu Thi Hanh

iv



ABSTRACT
This thesis conducts a study of syntactic and semantic features of determiners
in English noun phrases and their Vietnamese translation in the work “The Great
Gatsby”. Both descriptive and contrastive methods are used combined with the
qualitative and quantitative approach. In order to collect the data, a hand search
approach of the grammar books in both languages has been conducted, which helps
to find out then analyze 295 examples containing the words denoting determiners in
English and about 200 examples in Vietnamese together with a numerous number of
examples taken from various linguistics books, dictionaries, newspapers and from
the Internet. From the study’s results, the thesis gives a remarkably detailed
description of semantic and syntactic features in English speeches containing the
words denoting determiners in noun phrases with reference to their Vietnamese
equivalents and points out some similarities and differences between them. The
findings also aim at offering some practical implications for teaching and learning
English and Vietnamese as a foreign language. Finally, some suggestions for further
studies are put forward.

v


TABLE OF CONTENTS
CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY..................................................................................... iii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ................................................................................................... iv
ABSTRACT .............................................................................................................................. v
TABLE OF CONTENTS........................................................................................................ vi
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ........................................................................................... 1
1.1. Rationale. ........................................................................................................................... 1
1.2. Aims and objectives of the study..................................................................................... 2
1.3. Research questions ............................................................................................................. 2

1.4. Methods of the study.......................................................................................................... 2
1.5. Scope of the study .............................................................................................................. 3
1.6. Significant of the study ...................................................................................................... 3
1.7. Structure of the study ......................................................................................................... 3
CHAPTER 2. LITERATURE REVIEW ............................................................................... 5
2.1. Previous research. .............................................................................................................. 5
2.2. Theoretical background ..................................................................................................... 6
2.2.1. Concept of a phrase. ....................................................................................................... 6
2.2.2. Concept of a noun phrase. .............................................................................................. 7
2.2.3. Function of noun phrase. ................................................................................................ 9
2.3. Determiners in English .................................................................................................... 13
2.3. 4. Order of determiners.................................................................................................... 16
CHAPTER 3. LITERATURE REVIEW ............................................................................... 5
3.1. Research approach ........................................................................................................... 25
3.2. Methods of the study........................................................................................................ 25
3.3. Data collection and data analysis .................................................................................... 27
3.3.1. Data collection............................................................................................................... 27
3.2.2. Data analysis.................................................................................................................. 27
3.3. Summary ........................................................................................................................... 29
CHAPTER 4. STRUCTURAL AND SEMANTIC FEATURES OF DETERMINERS
IN ENGLISH NOUN PHRASES AND THEIR VIETNAMESE TRANSLATION IN
THE NOVEL “THE GREAT GATSBY”............................................................................ 30
4. The structural and semantic features of determiners in noun phrases in the novel “The
Great Gatsby”. ......................................................................................................................... 31
4.1. Pre determiner. Pre-determiner includes: ...................................................................... 32

vi


4.1.1. Multiplier: once,twice, three times... ........................................................................... 32

4.1.2. Fraction: half (a mile), one-fourth... ............................................................................ 33
4.1.3. Intensifier: what(a nice surprised), such(an interesting book), quite(along trip)... . 33
4.1.4. Quantifier: ...................................................................................................................... 33
4.2. Central determiner. Includes: .......................................................................................... 36
4.2.1. Article............................................................................................................................. 36
4.2.2.Demonstrative: ............................................................................................................... 40
4.2.3. Possessive: my,your,his................................................................................................ 42
4.3. Post determiner. Post determiner includes: ................................................................... 43
4.3.1. Cardinal number............................................................................................................ 43
4.3.2. Ordinal number ............................................................................................................. 44
4.3.3. Interrogative: What, which whose .............................................................................. 45
4.4. Implications for teaching and learning English determiners for Vietnamese learners of
English ...................................................................................................................................... 51
CHAPTER 5 : CONCLUSION ............................................................................................. 52
5.1. Recapitulation ................................................................................................................... 52
5.2. Concluding remarks ......................................................................................................... 52
5.3 Implication on teaching and learning .............................................................................. 53
5.4.Limitation and suggestions for further studies ............................................................... 53
5.4.1.Limitation........................................................................................................................ 53
5.4.2. Suggestions for further studies .................................................................................... 54
REFERENCES ........................................................................................................................ 55
APPENDIX.............................................................................................................................. 57

vii



CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
1.1. Rationale.
Vietnam is on the path of development and integration not only with the

countries in the region but also with countries around the world. It is easy to realize
that English language has been common in the world and more and more linguists
have been studying it. In fact, studying English language has become one of the
essential demands of people.
Therefore, learning and using English in communication becomes very
important and necessary. All English learners in general and Vietnamese learners in
particular desire to master English as native speakers. However, people often face to a
lot of difficulties that prevent them from gaining successful conversations. One of the
reasons of these problems is that they meet difficulty in understanding and using
determiners in English noun phrases in communication.
In English grammar, the structure of a noun phrase especially the determiners in
a noun phrase bring difficulties to teachers and learners of English since they have
many subclasses with different features as well as usages. Therefore, studying
determiners in a noun phrase is necessary to improve knowledge of English of the
leaners.
Theoretically, according to standard semantic accounts, a determiner is taken to denote
some function that yields a generalized quantifier qua noun phrase denotation from 1
the (restriction) set or property denoted by the nominal head 1 A generalized quantifier
is a set of sets in extensional systems.
Determiners in a noun phrase is an interesting theme in English grammar.
Besides, a noun phrase constitutes a heterogeneous class of items with numerous
subclasses. Thus, its scope is very large.
Practically, many researchers have analyzed the structural, functions and the
semantic features of determiners. However, the semantic and structural features of of
determiners in English noun phrases and their Vietnamese translation in a novel have
not been studied so far. There is a need to study the semantics and structures of
determiners in English and their Vietnamese equivalents in a novel. In the hope that
the result of this study can help Vietnamese learners of English improve their
understanding of determiners and apply them in communication so that their speech is
more adequate and effective. Thus, the topic “Determiners in English noun phrases

and their Vietnamese translation in the work ‘The Great Gatsby’ ” is chosen for my
study. Because of the limitation of time, my research only concentrates on basic noun
1


phrases not on complex ones. All the illustrations in my research are collected and
analyzed from the novel“ The Great Gatsby”.

.

Moreover, I am a teacher of English, studying the theme "Determiners in
English noun phrases and their Vietnamese translation in the work

‘The great

Gatsby’" will bring me good advantages; I have more chances to improve my
knovvledge and I can also use determiners more effectively.
1.2. Aims and objectives of the study
The study is expected to help learners of English master determiners in the
English noun phrases in terms of structural and semantic features effectively.
The paper is aimed at achieving the following objectives:
* To identify structural and semantic features of determiners in English noun
phrases and their Vietnamese translation in the work “The Great Gatsby”
* To find out the similarities and differences between determiners in English
noun phrases and their Vietnamese translation in the work “The Great Gatsby” in
terms of their structural and semantic features.
* To suggest some implications for teaching and learning determiners in
English noun phrases and their Vietnamese translation.
1.3. Research questions
1. What are the structural and semantic features of determiners in noun phrases

in the novel?
2. What are the similarities and differences between determiners in English
noun

phrases in the novel and their Vietnamese translation equivalents;
1.4. Methods of the study
The following methods are used in the research process:
+ Description: describing the syntax characteristics and meanings of

determiners.
+ Material analysis: reading reference books to find and collect needed
information. On the other hand, collecting the specific examples from the novel “The
Great Gatsby” for the study.
+ Consultations: having discussion with the supervisor, other lecturers and
friends.
+ Comparison and contrast: selecting, comparing and contrasting examples in
determiners in English and Vietnamese from grammar books, the internet, and as well
as from the novel “The Great Gatsby” in order to find the most similarities and
2


differences between determiners in English noun phrases and their Vietnamese
translation equivalants.
1.5. Scope of the study
The study focuses on analyzing determiners in English noun phrases with
reference to equivalents in Vietnamese.
The English and Vietnamese determiners in this study are collected from books,
the Internet,linguistics books, dictionaries, newspapers and from the Internet discuss in
the novel “The Great Gatsby”.
1.6. Significant of the study

This research refers to English and Vietnamese determiners in noun phrases to
find out their Vietnamese equivalent meanings.
From the study’s results, the thesis gives a remarkably detailed description of
semantic and syntactic features in English speeches containing the words denoting
determiners in noun phrases with reference to their Vietnamese equivalents and points
out some similarities and differences between them.
Hopefully, the result of the study will be useful for learners of English and
contribute a small part into the teaching and learning English as a foreign language in
Vietnam
1.7. Structure of the study
The study consists of five chapters, namely: Introduction, Literature review,
Methodology, Finding and discussion, and Conclusion, of which major contents are as
follows:
Chapter 1: Introduction
This chapter gives the rationale for the research, the aims, the scope of the
research the questions for the study as well as the structural organization of the study.
Chapter 2: Literature Review
This chapter presents the previous studies related to the research area and a
review of theoretical background, which is considered as a foundation for conducting
the whole research.
Chapter 3: Methodology
This chapter describes research approach, methods of the study and data collection and
data analysis
Chapter 4: Findings and discussion.
This chapter:
3


+


discusses issues of methodology and outline the research design, data

collection instruments, procedure of data collection.
+ presents the structural and semantic features of determiners in noun phrases
in the billingual novel, finds out the similarities and differences between determiners
in English and their Vietnamese translation equivalents in the novel, and give some
implications for teaching and learning them.
Chapter 5: Conclusion
This chapter summaries the whole content of the research, indicates the limitation, and
gives some recommendations and suggestions for a further research
References come at the end of the study.

4


CHAPTER 2. LITERATURE REVIEW
The literature review is divided into two main parts. The first part presents and
discusses the previous research works on derterminers in English noun phrases and
their Vietnamese equivalents. The second one gives a review of theoretical
background and framework of idioms in English and Vietnamese on which the whole
research has been based
2.1. Previous research.
As we all know, premodifiers modify the head noun and they are divided into 3
classes: predeterminers, determiners, post-detenniners. Among them, determiners cooccur with the head noun more commonly. Determiners appear before the head noun
and make the meaning of the head noun clearer. Linguists in the world have classified
them in different ways and also divided them into different subclasses. Some linguists,
basing on the most common function of determiners, have divided them into 2 classes.
The first class includes words which help to classify or identify. It has 4 subclasses:
indefinite article, definite article, demonstrative and possessive. The second includes
words which enable us to indicate quantity with 2 subclasses: number and quantifiers.

Other linguists do not keep the same idea. In their points, the English determiners
include 4 classes. They are article, demonstrative, identifier and possessive expression.
The last can be divided into 2 subclasses: possessive and nominal expression.
it is clear that studying determiners is not new; nonetheless, it has never been old.
There have been a number of studies on different kinds of English determiners. The
other descriptions of syntactic and semantic views are through different ages in the
history of linguistics as H. Sweet in “New English Grammar” (1891), Martha Kolln
(1994) or Veerenda “English Grammar Determiners” (2019) and Jeffrey Blokzijl
(2017).
In Vietnamese, determiners have only been recognized, collected and explained
systematically by some grammarians, post-graduators and authors of English centres,
such as: “Tìm hiểu về từ hạn định trong tiếng Anh”,(2018) by Lư Khúc Thành, from
VITINFO.COM page. In his writing, the author listed the English determiners, gave
their strutures, usages and some notations of using them; “A study on possessive
determiners in English and its equivalents in Vietnamese”,(2017) by Nguyễn Thị Thảo
Ly. In the study, the author gave the functions, strutures and semantic features of
English determiners and their Vietnamese equivalents.

5


In short, determiners in English are studied in terms of several aspects such as
grammar, semantics, rhetoric, pragmatics, etc which are investigated from different
views. However, the majority of scholars pay their attention to the two approaches.
Scholars who adopt the first approach are more structurally orientated. They describe
kinds of determiners, functions of determiners and their positions in terms of one or
more structural properties.
Atter studying several English grammar books written by foreign and
Vietnamese linguists, I totally agree with Randolph Quirks’s classification. According
to him, there are 6 classes of determiner with respect to their co- occurrence with the

noun classes: singular count, plural count and non - count noun. The classes are shown
as follow :
-

Article

-

Demonstrative

-

Possessive

-

Interrogative

-

Indefínite

-

Quantifier

However, all the researches only indecate the linguistic features of determiners, the
comparations on the semantic and structural features of determiners in English noun
phrases and their Vietnamese equivalents in a novel have not been studied so far.
Thus, the topic “Determiners in English noun phrases and their Vietnamese

translation in the work “The Great Gatsby” is chosen for my study.
2.2. Theoretical background
2.2.1. Concept of a phrase.
The term phrase is widely used in linguistic community but rarely a concrete definition
about it can be found in a grammar book. In most dictionaries and researches, phrases
are defined in a rather similar way. The Cambridge Encyclopaedia of the English
Language, for example, defines phrases as “syntactic construction which typically
contains more than one word' but which lacks the subject-predicate structure usually
found in a clause” (p.222) while the Longman Dictionary of Language Teaching and
Applied Linguistics gives another definition that “Phrase is a group of words which
form a grammatical unit A phrase does not contain a finite verb and does not have a
subject-predicate structure. For example:
- my job.

6


- her flat.
- Our lives
- Its color
From the two definitions above, it can be drawn out that a phrase may not always
consist of only one word, it may be one-word-phrase in cases of basic phrase; and
there is no subject-predicate structure exists in a phrase, which includes the excluding
of a finite verb, because this will make a phrase become a clause or a sentence. Phrases
are usually classified according to their head or central element and named after that
element.
2.2.2. Concept of a noun phrase.
According to R.Quirk,(A university grammar of English,59) “A noun phrase typically
function as subject, object, complement of sentences and as complement in
prepositional phrase. They are used to refer to things that people want to talk about

people, objects, processses and all kinds of entities in a way that is possibly redundant”
The first type of phrase is noun phrase. Noun phrases consist of a head, which is
typically a noun and of elements which (either obligatorily or optionally) determine
the head and (optionally) modify the head, or complement another element in the
phrase. Besides, noun phrase in English, in the book “Analyzing English” (1980),
Howard said that “The noun phrase in English is composed potentially three parts. The
central part of the noun phrase, the head, is obligatory: it is the minimal requirement
for the occurrence of a noun phrase.
Let’s analyze the examples below:
a. He loves beer. (NP analysis)
b. His love of beer. (DP analysis)
On the NP-analysis, his is a dependent of love in the same way that he is a
dependent of loves. The result is that the NP his love of beer and the clause He loves
beer are mostly parallel in structure, which seems correct given the semantic
parallelism across the two. In contrast, the DP analysis destroys the parallelism,
since his becomes head over love. The same point is true for a constituency-based
analysis:
These trees again employ the convention whereby the words themselves are used
as the node labels. The NP-analysis maintains the parallelism because the
determiner his appears as specifier in the NP headed by love in the same way
that he appears as specifier in the clause headed by loves. In contrast, the DP analysis

7


destroys this parallelism because his no longer appears as a specifier in the NP, but
rather as head over the noun.
In English and many closely related languages, constituents on left branches
underneath nouns cannot be separated from their nouns. Long-distance dependencies
are impossible between a noun and the constituents that normally appear on left

branches underneath the noun. This fact is addressed in terms of the Left Branch
Condition. Determiners and attributive adjectives are typical "left-branch constituents".
The observation is illustrated with examples of topicalization and wh-fronting:
(1a) Fred has helpful friends.
(1b) *...and helpful Fred has friends. - The attributive adjective helpful cannot be
topicalized away from its head friends.
(2a) Sam is waiting for the second train.
(2b) *...and second Sam is waiting for the train. - The attributive adjective second
cannot be topicalized away from its head train.
(3a) Susan has our car.
(3b) *Whose does Susan have car? - The interrogative determiner whose cannot
be wh-fronted away from its head car.
(4a) Sam is waiting for the second train.
(4b) *Which is Sam waiting for train? - The interrogative determiner which
cannot be wh-fronted away from its head train.
These examples illustrate that with respect to the long-distance dependencies of
topicalization and wh-fronting, determiners behave like attributive adjectives. Both
cannot be separated from their head noun. The NP-analysis is consistent with this
observation because it positions both attributive adjectives and determiners as leftbranch dependents of nouns. On a DP-analysis, however, determiners are no longer on
left branches underneath nouns. In other words, the traditional NP-analysis is
consistent with the fact that determiners behave just like attributive adjectives with
respect to long-distance dependencies, whereas the DP-analysis cannot appeal to left
branches to account for this behavior because on the DP-analysis, the determiner is no
longer on a left branch underneath the noun.
The NP-analysis is consistent with the observation that genitive case in languages
like Vietnamese can have the option to appear before or after the noun, whereby the
meaning remains largely the same, as illustrated with the following examples:
a. Nhà của anh trai tôi ‘the house of.my brother’

8



b. Nhà của anh trai tôi 'my brother's house'
In English the position and the number of words in snetence ‘a’ and ‘b’ are
different. The definite article ‘the’ must be used but in sentence ‘b’ it must be dropped.
Whereas, in Vietnamese, the number and position of words stay the same without
changing their meaning
While the b-phrases are somewhat archaic, they still occur on occasion in
elevated registers. The fact that the genitive NPs “the house of my brother”or “My
brother’s house” can precede or follow the noun is telling, since it suggests that the
hierarchical analysis of the two variants should be similar in a way that accommodates
the almost synonymous meanings. On the NP-analysis, these data are not a problem
because in both cases, the genitive expression is a dependent of the noun. The DPanalysis, in contrast, is challenged because in the b-variants, it takes the genitive
expression to be head over the noun. In other words, the DP-analysis has to account
for the fact that the meaning remains consistent despite the quite different structures
across the two variants.
As far as we know, language is the specific communication device of human.
Although each language has differences from others, they almost have the same parts
of speech such as: noun, pronoun, verb, adjective....Among them, nouns play an
important role in grammar and receive interests from linguists as well as grammarians
. As a result, there are several notions of noun .
According to L.G.Alexander{l988}: a noun tells us what something or someone
is called. And nouns are the names given to people, things, places ...in order to identify
them. For example: a noun can be the name of a person {John}, a job title {doctor },
the name of thing {radio},the name of place{London},the name of a quality {courage
} or the name of action {laughing}.
Similarly, other linguists also claim that a noun is usually defined as a word
denoting a thing, place, person, quality or action functioning as subject,object,
complement.
2.2.3. Function of noun phrase.

Noun phrases including nouns and pronouns perform eleven main grammatical
functions within sentences in the English language. The eleven functions of nouns and
noun phrases are:
 Noun phrase head
 Subject
 Subject complement

9





Direct object
Object complement



Indirect object



Prepositional complement



Noun phrase modifier
Determinative
Appositive






Adjunct adverbial
Nouns are traditionally defined as “persons, places, things, and ideas.” Noun
phrases are defined as phrases that consist of a noun or pronoun and any number of
constituents including adjectives, determiners, prepositional phrases, verb phrases, and
adjective clauses.
Noun Phrase Head
The first grammatical function that nouns perform is the noun phrase head. A noun
phrase consists of a noun including a pronoun plus any determiners, modifiers, and
complements. For example, the following italicized nouns function as noun phrase
heads:
 the small white ball
 someone to respect
 an old man who lived in a cottage
Subjects
The second grammatical function that noun phrases perform is the subject. A subject is
a word, phrase, or clause that performs the action of or acts upon the verb. For
example, the following italicized noun phrases function as subjects:
 The baby cried.
 Dogs and cats make excellent pets.
 I will have extensively studied English grammar.
Subject Complements
The third grammatical function that noun phrases perform is the subject complement.
A subject complement is a word, phrase, or clause that follows a copular, or linking,
verb and describes the subject of a clause. The terms predicate nominative and
predicate noun are also used for noun phrases that function as subject complements.
For example, the following italicized noun phrases function as predicate nominatives:

 My grandfather is a farmer.
 Our favorite pets are dogs with short hair.
 The woman whom you are looking for is she.
Direct Objects
10


The fourth grammatical function that noun phrases perform is the direct object. A
direct object is a word, phrase, or clause that follows a transitive verb and answers the
question “who?” or “what?” receives the action of the verb. For example, the
following italicized noun phrases function as direct objects:




The children ate all the cookies.
My professor recommended an extremely captivating book.
The woman has always hated mice and rats.

Object Complements
The fifth grammatical function that noun phrases perform is the object complement.
Object complements are defined as nouns, pronouns, noun phrases, adjectives, and
adjective phrases that directly follow and modify the direct object. For example, the
following italicized noun phrases function as object complements:



We consider our puppy our baby.
My aunt calls my uncle sweetheart.




America recently elected Barack Obama president.

Indirect Objects
The sixth grammatical function that noun phrases perform is the indirect object. An
indirect object is word, phrase, or clause that indicates to or for whom or what the
action of a ditransitive verb is performed. For example, the following italicized noun
phrases function as indirect objects:




My husband bought me flowers.
The child drew his mother a picture.
The salesman sold the company suffering from the scandal new computers.

Prepositional Complements
The seventh grammatical function that noun phrases perform is the prepositional
complement. A prepositional complement is a word, phrase, or clause that directly
follows a preposition and completes the meaning of the prepositional phrase. For
example, the following italicized noun phrases function as prepositional complements:
 My husband bought flowers for me.



The students studied during their spring break.
Because of the lengthy delay, we missed our flight.

Noun Phrase Modifiers

The eighth grammatical function that noun phrases perform is the noun phrase
modifier. A noun phrase modifier is a word, phrase, or clause that modifies or
describes a noun including a pronoun or a noun phrase. For example, the following
italicized noun phrases function as noun phrase modifiers:
 The child actor won an award.
11





The carpenter fixed the broken table leg.
We reserved twenty hotel rooms.

Determinatives
The ninth grammatical function that noun phrases can perform is the determinative.
Determinatives provide information such as familiarity, location, quantity, and
number. Possessive nouns — which are a noun, pronoun, or noun phrase and the
possessive clitic (apostrophe s or s apostrophe) — function as determinatives.
Possessive nouns indicate possession of or some other relationship to another noun or
noun phrase. For example, the following italicized noun phrases function as possessive
modifiers:
 My brother’s apartment is small.


I found everyone’s reports informative.



The man who stole my purse’s car has been towed.


Appositives
The tenth grammatical function that noun phrases perform is the appositive. An
appositive is a word, phrase, or clause that modifies or explains another noun phrase.
For example, the following italicized noun phrases function as appositives:
 My great-grandfather, the farmer, bought more farm land.
 The teacher of English, my cousin, assigns a lot of homework.
 The musician Stevie Nicks is a singer in the band Fleetwood Mac.
Adjunct Adverbials
The eleventh grammatical function that noun phrases perform is the adjunct adverbial.
An adjunct adverbial is a word, phrase, or clause that modifies an entire clause by
providing additional information about time, place, manner, condition, purpose,
reason, result, and concession. For example, the following italicized noun phrases
function as adjunct adverbials:
 Today the children woke up early.
 Yesterday the children slept in late.
 We decided to go home.
The eleven functions of noun phrases are noun phrase head, subject, subject
complement, direct object, object complement, indirect object, prepositional
complement, noun phrase modifier, determinative, appositive, and adjunct adverbial.
In short, nouns rarely appear alone. They often co-occur with other elements to
form noun phrases. Thus, a noun phrase is a phrase or a group of words with a noun as
the head. It means that in the phrase or the group of words, the noun is the most
important element. Beside it, there are a lot of other elements which help to make the
meaning of the head noun clearer. A noun phrase may be an indeterminately long and
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a complex structure. A head noun can be preceded by words such as an article, an
adjective, other nouns and, or followed by a prepositional phrase, relative

clause....These items are summed up as premodifiers and postmodifiers.
Premodifiers are words or phrases which precede a head noun and modify it.
Eg. - While Polho was still talking to me, I saw a young woman.
Whereas postmodifiers have the same function, it means postmodifiers also
modify the head noun, but follow the head noun.
Eg. - A young woman who has not known a man must die so that the country
may have rain.
The other two parts are optionally occurring. That is pre-modification and the
post-modification, shown as the following:
Determiner + pre-modifier + head noun + post modifier
Let's take a look at the following examples:
- The handsome man in the second row.
Here, the is determiner, handsome is pre-modifier, man is the head noun and in
the second row is post modifier.
- The husband and the wife were both very scared
In this sentence, the definite article determiner the precedes the headnoun
husband and wife to emphasize the headnoun in order to describe the state of the
couple in the circumstance.
2.3. Determiners in English
2.3.1. Definition of determiners
There have been a lot of points of view on determiners all over the world.
According to Merriem Webster, determiner is a word (such as “a,” “the,” “some,”
“any,” “my,” or “your”) that comes before a noun and is used to show which thing is
being referred to
Or ESL shared on the internet on January 17th, 2018 that “A determiner is a word
which is used to introduce a noun or a noun phrase.”.
Wwriteawriting also shared on the ineternet on May 1st, 2014 that “A category of
words that come with nouns in order to clarify the meaning of the noun are called the
determiners” and so on.
In summary, I think the following definition on determiners will be the best one:

“A determiner is a word that comes before a noun or noun phrase. A determiner
identifies whether the noun or noun phrase is general or specific”.
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We will come across these very often when studying the English language and it is
very important that we are aware of how to incorporate them into our own speech.
2.3.2. Functions of determiners
There has also been lots of definitions on determiners in English, for example,
In 1980, Plateau idetified that: “Function of determiner in general is to “pick out a
certain element or certain elements from a certain set of entities over which the hearer
intends to quantify” or the function of determiner is to “modify the scope of the set
designated by the noun that follows to restrict or widen, to specify or generalize the
meaning of the modified noun” (Stephanides,1978). Barrie (1971) describes the
determiner as “aspectual and/or modal particles [that gives] a particular colouring to
the noun they introduce, in much the same way as the different forms or auxiliaries of
the English verbs serve to convey aspectual or modal information, and enjoying a
semi-autonomous extence, in the sense that they sometimes modify strongly the value
of the noun they preface and sometimes merely reinfoce it”. Klegr (1987) concludes
that “the function of determiner appears to be to provide grammatical status combined
with specific semantic reference”. We can see definitions of unknown authors on the
internet like the followings:
“An important role in English grammar is played by determiners – words or
phrases that precede a noun or noun phrase and serve to express its reference in the
context to give more information about the noun”
“A determiner clarifies specific or general. It also identifies the relationship of
an item to the speaker.”.
“Determiners are used in every case to clarify the noun. Determiners may be used
to demonstrate or define something or someone. The function of a determiner is to express
proximity, relationship, quantity, and definiteness.”


2.3.3.Kinds of determiners:
Linguists have dissected that there are about 50 different determiners in the
English language. Atter studying several English grammar books written by foreign
and Vietnamese linguists, and searching information on the internet, ...I totally agree
with Randolph Quirks’s classification. According to him, there are 6 classes of
determiners.
The table below will indicate which noun classes will co-occur with members
of determiner class concerned.

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The head noun
Determiners
1. Article
1.1. Indefinite article.
1.2. Definite article
1.3. Zero article

Singular
count
noun
+

+
—

Plural Noncount count
noun noun

—

—

+

+

- I like to live in the countryside.

+

+

- Tigers are dangerous animals

+

- This is my student

2. Possessive

+

+

3. Demonstrative
3.1.This /That
3.2. These / those


+

+

4. Interrogative {who / which +
/what}

+

+

+

+

+

+

—

—

5.Indefinite
5.1 Some / any {unstressed}

—

5.2 Some / any {stressed }


+

5.3 Every / each / either

+

6. Quantifier {much,all,both}

—

Examples

—

—

+

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- I have a new house
- He needs an extra pen

- This girl is very beautiful
- These tables are made of wood
- Those girls come from
Vietnam
- Whose car is it ?
- Which girl do like best ?
- What colour do you like ?

- There are some people here .
- There is not any water in the
bottle
- A derivational suffix is only
applies to any morpheme..
- Each student has to study
harder.
- I have not got much money.


{+}: go with the noun class {- }: do not go with the noun class .
These contents are analyzed basing on their syntactic meaning. However, each kind of
determiner has its own usages so we will study them in more detail in next part.
2.3.4. Order of determiners
Pre-determiner + central determiner + noun phrase + post determiner
2.3.4.1. Pre-determiner
Pre-determiners include;
* quantifier: all, both, each...
* Multiplier: once, twice, three times...
* Fraction: half, one-fourth...
2.3. 4.1.1. Quantifier:
Quantifiers

are

used

to

ask


a

question,

such

as which, what,

and whose (personal possessive determiner). These determiners also depend on a
noun.
* The use of “all”
- All lions are animals, but not all animals are lions.
- People were coming from all directions (= every direction).
- All the food you ordered is on the table.
- All my homework has been completed.
- All this mail must be answered.
- He has lost all his money.
“All” can also be used with singular nouns showing something has been happening
for a whole period of time.
Ex:

- We’ve worked hard all year.
- He was out of work for all that time.

* The use of both
Both is used with plural nouns to mean ‘the two’ or ‘the one as well as the other’.
For example:
- She liked them both.
- We were both married.


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- Both of us were married.
“Both… and…” have the meaning “not only… but also…”
- Both her mother and her father went to her wedding.
- To be employed you will need a good knowledge of both English and
Vietnamese.
* The use of half
‘Half” is used with an amount equal to half of something/somebody
- I'll be in your house in half an hour.
- Half (of) the street was badly damaged.
- Half of the money belonged to me.
- He has a half share in the restaurent.
- Out of 36 candidates, half completed their graduation thesis protection.
* The use of each
“Each” is used to refer to every one of two or more people or things, when you are
thinking about them separately
- Each answer is worth 5 points.
- Each of the answers is worth 5 points.
“Each” is used for emphasis every single one
- I look forward to seeing each and every one of you soon.
* The use of some
Some is used with uncountable nouns or plural countable nouns to mean ‘an
amount of’ or ‘a number of’, when the amount or number is not given
- There's still some coffee in the jar.
- Would you like to have some more vegetables?
* The use of any
In negative sentences and questions any is usually used instead of ‘some’:

- I don't want any more vegetables.
- Is there any pepper left?
However, some is used in questions that expect a positive reply:
- Would you like some salt in your coffee?

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