Question

Choose the correct articles to fill in the blank-
Mother Teresa was _____ European but she devoted her life to social work as _____ Indian.
a)An ; an
b)A ; an
c)A ; a
d)The ; the

Answer 1

Hint: Read the given sentence and decipher what it wants to convey. Point out the nouns in the sentence. Now, go through the given options and choose the one that fits the context correctly. You can also use the ‘hit and trial’ method to choose the correct answer.

Complete answer: In English there are three articles: a, an, and the. Articles are used before nouns or noun equivalents and are a type of adjective. The definite article (the) is used before a noun to indicate that the identity of the noun is known to the reader. The indefinite article (a, an) is used before a noun that is general or when its identity is not known. There are certain situations in which a noun takes no article.
There is a little twist in the given sentence, ‘European’ starts with a vowel but while pronouncing, we say ‘You-ro-pi-un.’ Hence, it has a consonant sound and not a vowel sound. Thus we can say ‘a European’. Whereas, ‘Indian’ starts with a vowel and has a vowel sound as well. Hence, we can say ‘an Indian.’
Option ‘a’ is an incorrect option because we cannot use ‘an’ before ‘European’, as explained above.
Option ‘b’ is the correct option as the first blank has to be filled with ‘a’, and second with ‘an’.
Option ‘c’ is an incorrect option because the second blank won’t have ‘a’.
Option ‘d’ is a baseless option because ‘the’ wouldn’t be used in any of the given blanks.
Hence, option ‘b’ is the correct option.

Note: All things or things in general: Use no article with plural countable nouns or any uncountable nouns used to mean all or in general. When indicating an unspecified, limited amount of a countable or uncountable noun, use some.