# the Ukraine / Ukraine || Congo / The Congo  [article with country name]



## Moon Palace

Hello,
"the Ukraine / Ukraine"
I have heard and seen in the news both of these used to refer to the country.
Could somebody explain to me why the two are valid? I know that it may sometimes originate in the name of a river such as Niger, but in that case it doesn't work. And I know the same is true of Lebanon. Thanks for giving me the key to this mystery


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## Brioche

In English, the country is sometimes referred to as the Ukraine, as in _the Netherlands_, _the Gambia_, _the Sudan_ or _the Congo_.

Currently, the usage without the article is more common. Apparently the Ukrainian government prefers no article. [There are no articles in the Ukrainian language]

Once upon a time people said "The Argentine" for Argentina, but that's quite obsolete now.


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## Moon Palace

Thank you, Brioche. But would you by any chance know why it ever was the Argentina as it is the Ukraine? Because the Netherlands is like the UK, it has to do with it being a common noun originally. And the Congo, the Gambia, the Sudan are all rivers too if I am not mistaken. But Ukraine and Argentina are none of the above. This is what puzzles me.


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## panjandrum

*Zambia or The Zambia

Country names with "The"*

*articles before countries*


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## mgarizona

My understanding, such as it is, is the the Soviet government insisted on referring to Ukraine as "the" Ukraine in an attempt to nullify its identity as a nation and get everyone to think of it simply as an area.

Since its independence the Ukrainian government has insisted that the "the" be dropped, as it symbolizes the country's oppression.


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## Alxmrphi

Brioche said:


> Once upon a time people said "The Argentine" for Argentina, but that's quite obsolete now.



I hear this as an adjective, that's all I thought it was, I didn't know it can be used to refer to Argentina, as in the place. "This Argentine castle.....", but yeah it is more common to say Argentinian, but I am sure I have heard it used as an adjective as well.

I've never heard of "The Sudan" though, that strikes me as very odd.


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## mgarizona

In the 1800s the newly-formed country--- _la República Argentina_ or _Confederación Argentina_--- was commonly referred to as "The Argentine Republic" or "The Argentine Confederation," whence "The Argentine" for short.


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## Tim~!

Megabump:

I read in a style guide for Esperanto from a century ago that people should put an article in the name whereas they don't in other singular countries because the name _Ukraine _means "la landlimo", Esperanto for "the country's limit/end" etc.

If it's the case that Україна means "the land limit", English usage imposing "the" in front is consistent with how we speak about "The Hague" because the native use is "Den Haag".


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## Franzi

It's best to just memorize which country names take an article since it's a bit random and can change over time.  (I still always accidentally say "the Ukraine", but I'm trying to train myself out of it since I'm told it's highly offensive.)  Style guides, particularly ones used by newspapers, will often have a section on the "correct" version of country names.


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## Loob

Here's another related thread


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## ewie

mgarizona said:


> the Soviet government insisted on referring to Ukraine as "the" Ukraine


I wonder how they did that, given that Russian has no definite article as such _[Russian speakers feel free to correct me if this is wrong.  Moderators feel free to delete this for being tangential]_


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## Porteño

Brioche said:


> Once upon a time people said "The Argentine" for Argentina, but that's quite obsolete now.


 
Not down here, it isn't. We also refer to the people as being Argentines rather than Argentineans, which sounds horrible. Of course, I'm referring to the English-speaking people here since the natives call the country _Argentina_ and themselves _argentinos_.


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## ewie

Porteño said:


> Not down here, it isn't. We also refer to the people as being Argentines rather than Argentineans, which sounds horrible. Of course, I'm referring to the English-speaking people here since the natives call the country _Argentina_ and themselves _argentinos_.


_Argentineans_ may sound horrible to _you_, Porteño, but _Argentines_ sounds kind of ... erm ... what's the word I'm looking for? ... 'colonial' to me!
Okay, maybe not _colonial_ as such, but distinctly 19th-centuryish.


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## Porteño

ewie said:


> _Argentineans_ may sound horrible to _you_, Porteño, but _Argentines_ sounds kind of ... erm ... what's the word I'm looking for? ... 'colonial' to me!
> Okay, maybe not _colonial_ as such, but distinctly 19th-centuryish.


I don't quite follow your line of reasoning. However, you may be right that it is a hangover from the time when Argentina was considered by some to be '_the best non-colony_' in the Empire. That of course was a reference to the end of the 19th Century when the Argentine economy was dominated by the UK. (In fact the country was well on the way to being another Australia or Canada - pity it didn't work out!)


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## Loob

I agree with ewie. "Argentines" sounds slightly odd and antiquated to me too.

I remember Margaret Thatcher using the word. 

Nuff said.


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## ewie

Porteño said:


> I don't quite follow your line of reasoning.


It occasionally happens that a linguistic usage becomes 'fixed' in an 'emigré' population ... while usage in the 'motherland' moves on to new whatsits.  (I can think of a fairly large country to the west of here where this has happened)


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## Gwan

ewie said:


> I wonder how they did that, given that Russian has no definite article as such _[Russian speakers feel free to correct me if this is wrong.  Moderators feel free to delete this for being tangential]_


You are correct sir, poor Russian speaker as I am. Maybe they actually referred to it as something like '[the] Ukranian region' or such... Sadly I know not.
'The Ukraine' is always what comes out of my mouth, maybe in light of this thread I need to work on that.


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## Forero

I think Україна is Russian for "boundary".  I would guess (the) Soviets added the equivalent of "region" after it, which allowed languages with definite articles to supply one (and then delete "region").  However it was, Ukraine is now an independent country that prefers that we drop the _the_.


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## tacandr

Forero said:


> I think Україна is Russian for "boundary". I would guess (the) Soviets added the equivalent of "region" after it, which allowed languages with definite articles to supply one (and then delete "region"). However it was, Ukraine is now an independent country that prefers that we drop the _the_.


 
Russian has a different word for 'boundary'. To be exact 'Украина' as it is spelled in Russian is derived from Russian word 'окраина', or "edge, outskirts" in English. All of you are right that neither Russian nor Ukrainian have articles, being very similar in structure and semantics. In this respect, I can hardly imagine that Soviets would pursue any offensive or oppressive aim by adding the article under question. I'm saying this with confidence since it is absolutely true that neither Ukrainians nor Russians have any 'feel' for articles. We just do not understand their presence in a language unless we communicate long enough with native speakers. Moreover, when I studied English in a Russian but Ukraine-based school I always thought that the definite article before Ukraine somehow underlined the exclusiveness of this republic and never did it occur to me that the article was meant to devaluate Ukraine as a nation and to refer to it as to area only. As for the question 'why'... Well, they have introduced a lot of new things to Ukrainian since the independence was declared so it is just a tendency to keep away from anything that "Moscow did" and nothing more. 

PS. Soviets never added the equivalent of "region" after it, there was no need to do this


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## Nunty

Mod hat on:
Erm... this is the *English Only* forum, so please limit the discussion to *English *usage, not Esperanto or Russian or Hebrew (though I'm biting my tongue). Thank you.

Mod hat off:
I think we need to remember that AE and BE do not always follow the same conventions for the definite article with the name of country. That being the case, it seems to me that any explanation based on logic is doomed to failure.


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## Andreyevich

Ukraine meant "land on the edge" in Old Russian. I guess that when it was anglicised, it was regarded as: "the land on the edge", or the Ukraine.

Ukraine was only a territory, so it was not referred to as a nation until its own independence.


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## Andreyevich

Tim~! said:


> *Sigh*
> 
> My post _was_ for English.  Nobody had answered the thread title about why we often place an article in front of the country name in English.



I believe that I did. I think it was due to the anglicisation of the Old Russian name, which would have been translated to English as something like: "land on the edge". For English speakers, this would have been better as: "The Ukraine" - "The Land on the Edge", which would have given Ukraine a more significant status - it was referred to as "The" (one and only) Ukraine, not simply "Russia's border".

The fact that Ukraine was only a territory at the time meant that it was not regarded as a "nation" (in the strictest sense of the word).

Essentially, I believe that Ukraine was referred to as: "The Ukraine" due to the anglicisation of an altogether insignificant name - it was named merely as being a territory "on the edge" of Russia. 

Similar examples are: "The Rhineland" of Germany, or "The Saarland". These all refer to regions/territories, hence the use of articles.

It is also probably an older convention - I doubt that any new regions or territories would be named with an article, unless they were plurals.


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## ewie

I'm having a little trouble getting my head round your theory, Andreyevich.  (While part of my brain is admiring the 'logic' behind it, another large part is going, "Yes, but how would this actually _work_?")

I suppose what you're proposing goes like this ~
*The scene: 15th century Russia.*
*British explorer: *_I say, what do you call that place over there, Andrei?_
*Andrei:*_ We call that Ukraina._
*BE: *_Does that mean anything in particular?_
*Andrei: *_It means 'land on edge'._
*BE: *_Don't you mean 'the land on the edge'?_
*Andrei: *_What is this 'the'?  It means 'land on edge', dummy._
*BE:*_ Oh, okay.  Still, that sounds a bit 'off' to me, so if it's okay with you I'll call it The Ukraina, or The Land on the Edge.  No-one will ever mind that._


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## Andreyevich

I understand what you're saying completely.

I've found two other theories in an online article by Andrew Gregorovich on Infoukes, a website dedicated to Ukraine and Ukrainians.

Gregorovich suggests that "many Ukrainian immigrant scholars, due to their imperfect knowledge of English, used the form "the Ukraine" in their books"

He goes on to mention that: "Sir Bernard Pares the eminent English historian of Russia suggested that "the Ukraine" came from French usage. We say la France, le Canada and l'Ukraine in French"

[As quoted from an article in the FAQ section of InfoUkes.com]

I don't know whether Mr. Gregorovich is an authority on such matters, but I assume, due to the posting of his article on such a website, that his claims must at least be shared by others. Unfortunately, I can't post a link to the website because I have not posted more than 30 posts .


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## Brioche

mgarizona said:


> My understanding, such as it is, is the the Soviet government insisted on referring to Ukraine as "the" Ukraine in an attempt to nullify its identity as a nation and get everyone to think of it simply as an area.
> 
> Since its independence the Ukrainian government has insisted that the "the" be dropped, as it symbolizes the country's oppression.



During the Soviet era, [the] Ukraine was sufficiently a separate country to be a member of the United Nations. 
The same thing applied for Belarus/Byelorussia/White Russia.

Thus the Soviet leadership always had 3 votes in the UN.
USSR, [the] Ukraine & Belarus.

Note: there is no "the" in Russian or Ukrainian.


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## ewie

*Here's* Andreyevich's article


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## Beef

Hello everyone. Just a question concerning the definite article or lack of it with the names of countries. The grammar books tell us that  that we use "the" with plurals ie the United States, the Netherlands, the Seychelles or when the country contains an adjective telling us about the type/ nature of that  country eg the Czech Republic, the United Kingdom. What about the Ukraine? We  wouldn´t say I went to Ukraine,but I went to THE Ukraine. Any thoughts please.


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## amgfnyc

I have actually heard people say, "I visited Ukraine," but I agree with you, it sounds odd. Not sure what is correct!


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## katie_here

amgfnyc said:


> I have actually heard people say, "I visited Ukraine," but I agree with you, it sounds odd. Not sure what is correct!


What does Ukraine mean in Ukranian. It may be a plural word. We call France, France but the French call it La France. 

I don't have the answer, but it may be an idea.

Edited to add I've just found this if it's of any use. 


> The *Ukraine*, which means _borderland,_ is located between Europe, Russia, and Asia, on the northern shore of the Black Sea.


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## TriglavNationalPark

As far as I know, Ukraine has generally been referred to without a definite article since independence. "The Ukraine" was the most common English-language form in Soviet times.

EDIT:

"The country was formerly often referred to as _the Ukraine_, but, since Ukrainian independence in 1991, just _Ukraine_ without the definite article is now predominant in diplomacy and journalism, and also conforming to the usual English grammar rules for names of countries."

--Wikipedia


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## Thomas1

I believe Ukraine may have retained its article because it was once part of the USSR where it was treated as an area, hence the article. I also believe that more and more people use the name without the article bercause in fact the Ukrainian government prefers no article. A similar story was with Argentina.

Tom


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## KHS

Thomas1 said:


> ...I also believe that more and more people use the name without the article because in fact the Ukrainian government prefers no article. A similar story was with Argentina.


 
Yes, a Ukrainian student was the first to alert me to this. 

Yet another example is Congo (of which, of course, there are two). I do use *the* DRC (for Congo-Kinshasa), but that is because the form of government is part of the name.

Sudan is still another which has undergone the transformation. And Lebanon. And probably some others I will think of in another 5 minutes.  (The older you are, the more countries you remember *formerly* had 'the' before their names.)


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## Grop

katie_here said:


> What does Ukraine mean in Ukranian. It may be a plural word. We call France, France but the French call it La France


 
Hello Katie, likewise, we say la Grande-Bretagne, l'Allemagne (Germany), le Pérou, la Roumanie, etc. We use the definite article for any country: I think this is irrelevant.

If _the Ukraine_ is frequent, (this is a wild guess), maybe _the UK_ attracts _Ukraine_ into being _the Ukraine_.


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## ewie

*Moderator note: *Hello Beef ~ I've taken the liberty of merging your thread with this long one on the subject of _[The] Ukraine_ from a few months ago ~ might be worth a read.
(Don't forget you can very easily search for previous threads on a subject by using the 'Search this forum' box on the index page)


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## katie_here

Thank you Grop for clarifiying that point. At least I understand now, that "La and Le" don't mean anything in particular when referering to a country.


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## Santanawinds

hello!
For some reason I always thought the name of the country Ukraine in English includes the article "the": The Ukraine.

For example:
I went to the Ukraine.
as opposed to:
I went to Ukraine.

or
I am visiting the Ukraine.
as opposed to:
I am visiting Ukraine.

But now I see both ways are used on the web. Which is correct?
Thanks!


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## Andrew1980

I always use just "Ukraine" without "the". It is uncountable geographical noun so there is no need to emphasize, it seems to me. "The USA" is because there a lot of states maybe, but the question is interesting.


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## ewie

*Moderator note: *Hello Santanawinds ~ I've merged your thread with this previous one on the subject of _[The] Ukraine_.
(Don't forget you can very easily search for previous threads on a  subject by using the 'Search this forum' box on the index page)


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## Santanawinds

Thanks! Now I see, it is Ukraine without the article.


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## natkretep

I'm going to put forward what is probably a silly theory to explain why I find myself saying _the Ukraine_. For me the -_aine_ makes the word sound like an adjective in English, and one way of turning adjectives into nouns is to add an article (_the rich, _etc.).

But yes, if Ukraine says it doesn't want the article, I suppose we should respect that.


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## Pedro y La Torre

natkretep said:


> But yes, if Ukraine says it doesn't want the article, I suppose we should respect that.


Why should the Ukrainian government have the final say on English semantic preferences? 

I have noticed a trend on behalf of BBC journalists to drop the "the" from the Ukraine over the past while (though this is not the case in respect of the Irish state broadcaster, RTE). Such usage sounds really strange to my ears, I grew up saying the Ukraine and the Lebanon and will continue to do so.


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## Forero

Pedro y La Torre said:


> Why should the Ukrainian government have the final say on English semantic preferences?
> 
> I have noticed a trend on behalf of BBC journalists to drop the "the" from the Ukraine over the past while (though this is not the case in respect of the Irish state broadcaster, RTE). Such usage sounds really strange to my ears, I grew up saying the Ukraine and the Lebanon and will continue to do so.


The UN and the CIA, among other groups, have lists of "official" translations and "official" names of countries and such. Presumably this is to keep people from translating the name of a country to something like "Badguyvania", "Ugliness", or "Evilempire".

I doubt Greece would keep quiet if we started calling all Greeks "Geeks". (They might even insist we call their people "Grecians".)

Such terms as "Dutch" (= (Teutonic) people) and "Welsh" (= foreigners) are essentially "grandfathered" until the countries in question find it to be too big a problem.


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## KHS

Pedro y La Torre said:


> Why should the Ukrainian government have the final say on English semantic preferences?
> 
> I have noticed a trend on behalf of BBC journalists to drop the "the" from the Ukraine over the past while (though this is not the case in respect of the Irish state broadcaster, RTE). Such usage sounds really strange to my ears, I grew up saying the Ukraine and the Lebanon and will continue to do so.


I don't think it's a matter of who has the right to do it. I think it's a matter of a willingness on the part of English speakers to respect the desires of another nation.  

In addition, use of the article (The Ukraine) violates the general pattern in English to NOT include an article when just the name (versus the form of government) is used.  E.g., America vs The United States of America


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## Pedro y La Torre

KHS said:


> In addition, use of the article (The Ukraine) violates the general pattern in English to NOT include an article when just the name (versus the form of government) is used.  E.g., America vs The United States of America



And what of:

The Gambia?
The Congo?
The Sudan?
The Philippines?
The Netherlands?

The Ukraine (like the Crimea) is how the territory/country has always been referred to in my part of the world and I see no reason to change.


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## Myridon

KHS said:


> the desires of another nation


I believe they desire to call it Україна.


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## KHS

Pedro y La Torre said:


> And what of:
> 
> The Gambia?
> The Congo?
> The Sudan?
> The Philippines?
> The Netherlands?
> 
> The Ukraine (like the Crimea) is how the territory/country has always been referred to in my part of the world and I see no reason to change.



Actually, while those used to be exceptions to the general rule, as far as I am aware, Gambia, Congo and Sudan (North or South) no longer use "The".  And when we call it Holland, no THE.  The fact that they were "nether lands" is probably what initiated THE. I agree that both The Philippines and The Netherlands still use THE.  I would argue, though, that they are exceptions to the rule.

Many people prefer to use older forms in certain cases, and I am no exception.  We pick forms that we are attached to for one reason or another.


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## RM1(SS)

Pedro y La Torre said:


> And what of:
> 
> The Gambia?
> The Congo?
> The Sudan?
> The Philippines?
> The Netherlands?
> 
> The Ukraine (like the Crimea) is how the territory/country has always been referred to in my part of the world and I see no reason to change.


I always include the article when saying those countries' names.  I've read "The Argentine" in old books (mostly, if not all, by British authors), but I don't believe I've ever heard anyone actually say it.  And "The Lebanon" is a new one on me.


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## bennymix

This has an alice-in-wonderland quality.   As Myridon said,



> Originally Posted by *KHS*
> 
> _the desires of another nation_
> 
> 
> [Myr:] I believe they desire to call it Україна.



To say they [Ukrainians in their own country] desire the article when they don't have one [or any] is passing strange.    Perhaps we are dealing with problems of exiles [or expatriates] and politics.   I recall exiles from what's officially Myanmar, preferred, here in Canada to call their country 'Burma' and themselves 'Burmese.'


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## Budspok

I don’t think Russia has anything to do with the “the” use in English language. As for some Ukrainians preferring their country to be called differently as to what it has been traditionally called in other languages seems absolutely absurd. If the Germans say “We prefer our country’s name  to be changed Germany to Deutschland in English”, Hungarians would prefer Magyar etc. does it mean all English speaking countries should immediately do so? 
       Does anyone really think that using “the” in “the Ukraine” has some derogatory whiff about it? To my mind, on the contrary it gives exclusiveness to the country in the good sense of the word.


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## jarabina

The reason it was 'the Ukraine' and not Ukraine originally was because it was a region and we often put 'the' before regions (the Dordogne), but not before singular, single, country names. This is why, I beleive, Ukrainians dislike 'the Ukraine'.

The Ukrainians seem to be particularly sensitive about how native speakers of English refer to their country (and its various parts) in English (e.g. the current attempt to push for Kyiv rather than Kiev). Looking forward to the rest of the world calling Scotland Scotland


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## Pedro y La Torre

RM1(SS) said:


> I always include the article when saying those countries' names.  I've read "The Argentine" in old books (mostly, if not all, by British authors), but I don't believe I've ever heard anyone actually say it.  And "The Lebanon" is a new one on me.


I don't know whether the Lebanon is particular to British English (and influenced dialects) or not, but it's certainly current in Ireland, cf:


> An excited group of wives, children and parents filled Dublin Airport’s arrivals lounge today to welcome home a planeload of troops from the Lebanon.


Video: Irish troops get big welcome on return from Lebanon



KHS said:


> Actually, while those used to be exceptions to the general rule, as far as I am aware, Gambia, Congo and Sudan (North or South) no longer use "The". And when we call it Holland, no THE. The fact that they were "nether lands" is probably what initiated THE. I agree that both The Philippines and The Netherlands still use THE. I would argue, though, that they are exceptions to the rule.


Usage of "the" in respect of The Gambia (officially named Republic of the Gambia) and The Congo is still current here. "The Sudan" has become somewhat less current (perhaps due to the division of the country) but is still heard.

Using "Ukraine" or "Crimea" instead of "the Ukraine" or "the Crimea" simply doesn't sound right to me and I shan't be lopping of the "the" any time soon. To each his own, however.


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## KHS

I just checked the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA), and searched for Ukraine.  Of the first 40 instances, only 5 used "the"
http://corpus.byu.edu/coca/x.asp?r1=&w=1024&h=600


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## Fumiko Take

So far the only contries I know that have given names go with "the" are "The Netherlands", "The Congo" and some contries formed by islands. It's no wonder about the islands contries. But why do we have "The Netherlands" and "The Congo" in English? Does that have anything to do with their etymology in the native languages? It's not like in French that they always use articles before contry names.


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## m1517luther

and the Philippines.
It seems Congo originally means the Congo river or the water basin of it, adding "the" before Congo helps to relieve (relieve?? what is the verb I should use here??*) the confusion between the geographic term and the country.


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## entangledbank

There's no good reason for some countries that traditionally could take 'the': there were the Congo, the Lebanon, the Sudan, and the Ukraine*, as well as those where 'the' is justified by grammar. (I'm not sure which side to include the Transvaal). In the present day these are generally said without 'the'. Only The Gambia actually specifies 'the' as part of the country name, and the Netherlands is still said.

* oh yes, and the Yemen. But Arabic is like French in that it uses the definite article prolifically, so translation from Arabic isn't a good reason.


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## Copyright

You might like to look at this BBC News Magazine article: Ukraine or the Ukraine: Why do some country names have 'the'?

There are many other country names that are habitually referred to with "the", such as Congo, Gambia, Yemen, Lebanon, Sudan, Netherlands, Philippines and Bahamas.

But according to several authoritative sources, such as the CIA World Factbook, the Times Comprehensive Atlas of the World and the US Department of State, *only two countries, The Bahamas and The Gambia, should officially be referred to with the article.*

*The two Congos* are officially Democratic Republic of the Congo and Republic of the Congo. And the longer, official name for Netherlands is Kingdom of the Netherlands.

There is more on that link, of course.


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## ain'ttranslationfun?

Hi, Fumiko, You specified "some countries formed by islands", and some replies included examples of these (the Philippines...) - but Indonesia (without 'the') is composed of islands and parts of others. There are also "The United States of America" and"The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland" - both of which are composed (only partly, in the case of the former) of islands. The British also say, or used to say, "The Argentine" and "The Palestine" as well as "The Lebanon". We also do say, as Copyright mentions, Ukraine and Ivory Coast without 'the'. - m1517luther, I think the verb you were looking for is "to avoid confusion".


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## Fumiko Take

Thanks for the reference, Copyright. And I said "some", not "all", ainttranslationfun?.


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## Sparky Malarky

Copyright said:


> There are many other country names that are habitually referred to with "the", such as Congo, Gambia, Yemen, Lebanon, Sudan, Netherlands, Philippines and Bahamas.
> 
> But according to several authoritative sources, such as the CIA World Factbook, the Times Comprehensive Atlas of the World and the US Department of State, *only two countries, The Bahamas and The Gambia, should officially be referred to with the article.*


The US Department of State does not recognize The United States of America?  Surprising!



ain'ttranslationfun? said:


> Hi, Fumiko, You specified "some countries formed by islands", and some replies included examples of these (the Philippines...) - but Indonesia (without 'the') is composed of islands and parts of others. There are also "The United States of America" and"The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland" - both of which are composed (only partly, in the case of the former) of islands. The British also say, or used to say, "The Argentine" and "The Palestine" as well as "The Lebanon". We also do say, as Copyright mentions, Ukraine and Ivory Coast without 'the'. - m1517luther, I think the verb you were looking for is "to avoid confusion".


Thank you for explaining this.  I had never heard "the Lebanon."


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## Copyright

Sparky Malarky said:


> The US Department of State does not recognize The United States of America?  Surprising!


If "The" were part of the name, it would be capitalized (which it is in your rendering, but not in real life, I don't believe). As it is, I no longer live in *the* United States of America.


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## ain'ttranslationfun?

I was referrred here by a post today by sdgraham in the thread " the Ukraine or Ukraine? ". I think BE speakers also used to refer to "the Palestine", no?


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## Pedro y La Torre

No. You must be confusing Palestine with the Lebanon, which is still used (see above).


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## kentix

It was always my impression that "the Lebanon" signified a British speaker. I haven't heard it here by an American speaker in my lifetime. But I don't know if American speakers used that form decades or more ago.


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## Pedro y La Torre

British...or Irish or Australian or anywhere outside the US and Canada, basically.


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## Thomas Tompion

There's a similar problem facing English people talking about French regions and departments.

Some French departments are masculine (Le Calvados) and some feminine (L'Aveyron), and the linguistic treatment to express _in_ is different, depending on gender (it's _Dans le Calvados_ but _En Aveyron_).

How do we cope with this in English?  Do we say _In Aveyron_, but _In the Calvados_? There's a similar problem with regions: it's_ Le Limousin_, but _La Touraine_. Should we say_ In the Limousin_ but_ In Touraine_?


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## Pedro y La Torre

Why import French grammatical niceties into English? Unless established usage indicates otherwise, in Calvados, in Aveyron or in Limousin all sound fine to me.


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## Şafak

Maybe you'll find it intersting to know that nowadays you can't find an modern English textbook in Russia or Ukraine (at least it wasn't possible to find one in Ukraine before the current politcal crisis between the countries) that would call the country "the Ukraine". Indeed the country was called "the Ukraine" in English textbooks in the USSR but, apparently, with the dissolution of the USSR the name (or you can call it "the trend") has changed. What I've also noticed is that many nationalism-driven Ukrainians prefer their country to be called "the Ukraine" because it sort of ascends the country to the league of a handful of "the" countries: the UK, the US, the Netherlands, the Ukraine etc. That's why they were unbelievably happy when Donald Trump referred to the country as "the Ukraine" a couple of times (always? throughout his term?).


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## Pedro y La Torre

I thought it was the opposite, namely that they objected to the use of "the" Ukraine?



> “Let us kindly help you use words related to #Ukraine correctly,” the Ukrainian embassy in Washington D.C. wrote on Twitter Saturday. It’s “Ukraine, not ‘the’ Ukraine,” the embassy wrote. And the capital city, it said, is spelled “Kyiv, not Kiev.”



https://www.washingtonpost.com/worl...not-ukraine-ukrainians-want-you-get-it-right/

The campaign to drop the "the" has been successful going by media references to "Ukraine" as opposed to "the Ukraine". Kyiv instead of Kiev, on the other hand, has not really caught on (yet).


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## Şafak

Pedro y La Torre said:


> I thought it was the opposite, namely that they objected to the use of "the" Ukraine?
> 
> 
> 
> https://www.washingtonpost.com/worl...not-ukraine-ukrainians-want-you-get-it-right/
> 
> The campaign to drop the "the" has been successful going by media references to "Ukraine" as opposed to "the Ukraine". Kyiv instead of Kiev, on the other hand, has not really caught on.


Very interesting. As always there are many different trends within one country. I can only judge by the news I read  . Hence my impression that they want their country to be called "the Ukraine" because it's "cool" or something.

Apparently, it's not as simple as I initally thought.
Thanks.


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## Thomas Tompion

Pedro y La Torre said:


> Why import French grammatical niceties into English? Unless established usage indicates otherwise, in Calvados, in Aveyron or in Limousin all sound fine to me.


Of course my question was about what established usage dictates.  _In the Calvados_, _in the Limousin_,_ in Touraine_, and_ in the Gers_ all sound fine to me.


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## galakha

Pedro y La Torre said:


> Kyiv instead of Kiev, on the other hand, has not really caught on (yet).


For what it's worth, it has already been claimed a victory among the Ukrainians who care since the United States Board on Geographic Names has issued a decision to recognize "Kyiv" as the only correct spelling for the capital of Ukraine.



Pedro y La Torre said:


> I thought it was the opposite, namely that they objected to the use of "the" Ukraine?


It's definitely the opposite for I haven't seen anyone from Ukraine approving of "the Ukraine"


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## Pedro y La Torre

We still say ''Kiev'' however it's spelled but I'm not sure if they care about that or not.


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## Şafak

galakha said:


> It's definitely the opposite for I haven't seen anyone from Ukraine approving of "the Ukraine"


Russian progaganda at its finest!


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## Αγγελος

Could it possibly be due to the influence of German?
In German, countries are normally neuter in gender and don't take the definite article, *but *if they are feminine, they do: _die Scweiz, die Türkei, die Ukraine. _And perhaps English speakers mostly first heard of the Ukraine [there! I, too, usually use the article with it!] through German-language sources.
Then again, I have never heard anyone say '_the_ Lebanon'!


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## Pedro y La Torre

Then you must be unfamiliar with British English.


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