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HUNGARIAN-ENGLISH LINGUISTIC CONTRASTS. A PRACTICAL APPROACH He plays the piano. The elephant is the largest land animal. The reversible plough is useful for fields which need to be kept perfectly flat for irrigation purposes. 5.3.2 Contrasts between English and Hungarian article usage There are various differences between the use of English and Hungarian articles, but here we shall focus only on the most important and most troublesome issue: generic reference. The above discussion of English articles shows that in English allthe three articles (a(n), the, and zero) can be used for generic reference: a(n): with singular countable nouns and designating ‘any person or thing of the class’. zero: with plural and uncountable nouns and referring to the class as a whole. the: with singular countable nouns A horse is a beautiful animal. Horses are beautiful animals. The horse is a beautiful animal. In Hungarian, generic reference is expressed by the definite article. However, the definite article is also used for specific definite reference. Thus, we get the following picture. A macska leült a labtérlére. (specific) — The cat sat on the map. A macska nagyon okos állat. (generic) — Cats are very smart animals. — A cat is a very smart animal. — The cat is a very smart animal. Beleugrott a vizbe. (specific) — He jumped into the water. A viz élet. (generic) — Water is life. Note that in the case of uncountable nouns the definite article is not used for generic reference at all. Only the zero article is used: A viz elet. — Water is life. A tej feher. — Milk is white A történelem nem ismétli magát. — History does not repeat itself. However, adjectives used as heads of noun phrases take the definite article in generic reference, as in The Naked and the Dead. Ihe differences between generic reference in English and Hungarian are summarised in Table 6. % The title of a novel by Norman Mailer. + 76 +
