English Deutsch Français Italiano Español Português 繁體中文 Bahasa Indonesia Tiếng Việt ภาษาไทย
All categories

One: He used to be the president of a college.
Two: He used to be a president of a college.

2006-06-09 04:29:05 · 7 answers · asked by immonen33 1 in Society & Culture Languages

7 answers

I'd say One, unless that college has more than one president at a time (which doesn't make sense to me).

You almost always need "the" before a noun phrase with "of" in it.

2006-06-09 22:14:32 · answer #1 · answered by Goddess of Grammar 7 · 1 0

they are both correct depending on how many presidents of the college there are or were. if it was a plural amount of presidents then it would be the second one , if singular , then the first one.

2006-06-09 11:34:31 · answer #2 · answered by to whom it may confide 3 · 0 0

one. He used to be THE president of a college. if you use a president of a college, it could mean that it was 100 years ago, or something...hope this helps, and thanks for the 2 points!!!!!

2006-06-09 11:34:33 · answer #3 · answered by believer_920 2 · 0 0

The first one sounds good to me whereas the seconnd one doesn't! You'd say "he used to be a college president" but you wouldn't repeat "a" twice.

2006-06-09 14:29:22 · answer #4 · answered by fabee 6 · 0 0

They are both correct, the first one, to me, just seems to emphasise the importance of the position, the second has no real importance laid on the position of president.

definte and indefinte articles

2006-06-09 13:30:26 · answer #5 · answered by psicatt 3 · 0 0

Depends on which sense you are using. Both could be accounted for.

2006-06-09 11:32:36 · answer #6 · answered by mthtchr05 5 · 0 0

Both seems correct

2006-06-09 14:51:23 · answer #7 · answered by BooGaruBoo 2 · 0 0

fedest.com, questions and answers