Question

Fill in the blanks with the most suitable articles:
____ man you saw here yesterday is ___ uncle of mine.
a) the, the
b) the, a
c) the, an
d) a, an

Answer 1

Hint: Indefinite articles are usually used before a noun that is general or when its identity is not known. Definite articles are used when the identity is certain, however not before a proper noun.

Complete answer:Indefinite articles are used for a thing or person when the reader doesn’t know which one we are referring to out of many nouns. It is used for denoting the random nature of an object.
‘The’ is used as a definite article for a thing or person when the reader knows which one we are exactly referring to. It states the specific nature of the subject.
The word ‘French’ is a proper noun. So, there will not be any article in front of it, as it is already a distinct noun. However, the word ‘language’ is a common noun. The word ‘easy’ comes before it, which makes a vowel sound.
In the given sentence, the first noun i.e. ‘man’ refers to a specific man. So, we need a definite article. The second noun implies that that uncle is one of many uncles. So, we need indefinite articles.

Now, we know what we are looking for. Let’s look at the given options-
a) the, the - The first blank should be a definite article, which is correct. However, this option is incorrect as there should be no definite article before ‘uncle’. The second blank is incorrect. This is not the required answer. So, this is an incorrect option.
b) the, a - The first blank should be a definite article, which is correct. However, this option is incorrect as there should be another indefinite article before ‘uncle’. The second blank is incorrect. This is not the required answer. So, this is an incorrect option.
c) the, an - The first blank should be a definite article, which is correct. And, this option is correct as there should be ‘an’ as an indefinite article before ‘uncle’. The second blank is correct. This is the required answer. So, this is the correct option.
d) a, an - The first blank should be a definite article, which is incorrect. And, this option is incorrect as there should be no indefinite article before ‘man’. The second blank is correct. This is not the required answer. So, this is an incorrect option.

Note:
 To choose the correct indefinite or definite article, pronounce the word after it. If it is a vowel sound, there will be only one correct option. That will be the correct answer for the given sentence.