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There is a movie called A History of Britain. Why is the indefinite article used? I have always thought in such cases the article must be definite because a country's history (or that of anything else) is something which is ‘one of a kind’. And both movies and articles on the Internet seem to follow this rule:

However, having started looking for information about this I found that in titles there may not be an article, but in the text itself definite article is used: History of France

I have the following questions:

  • Should I use definite article (the) when referring to history of something?
  • As for A History of Britain: why is the indefinite article “a” used? Does it mean this is another interpretation of/movie on the British history?
Mari-Lou A
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olegst
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    There is some leeway in titles. Here, it's because there are many histories of Britain, and the (screenwriter?) is humble enough to acknowledge that this isn't the definitive one. The Life of Brian is only about one person. To Kill a Mockingbird means any mockingbird, not that one. – anongoodnurse Apr 13 '15 at 05:18
  • I don't fully agree with the duplicate question. Definitely it is connected, but I'm not sure it completely answers the OP's questions: 1) Should I use the definite article (the) when referring to the history of a country? 2) Why is the indefinite article (a) used in the title: A history of Britain. – Mari-Lou A Apr 13 '15 at 06:01
  • This "Community" profile says: Hi, I'm not really a person.... So, now questions get automatically closed by a computer?! – Mari-Lou A Apr 13 '15 at 06:05
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    You have the right idea about the meaning of the definite vs. indefinite articles, but you've got the context wrong. The movie title is "A History..." because it's implying that its presentation may not be in agreement with other histories. In this case, "history" means the author's presentation of that history, not the objective history that is, ostensibly, unique. So yes, there is indeed only one history of Britain, but many histories have been written to present it. If you write "the history" of Britain, then you actually shaped the events; but to write "a history", you need only a pen. – Larry Terrell Apr 13 '15 at 06:23
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    @Mari-LouA I can't tell, but it was probably closed by the OP as a dupe -- that is, he accepted the suggestion. – Andrew Leach Apr 14 '15 at 17:44
  • @pizza I probably could if Safari on an iPad had onhover. – Andrew Leach Apr 14 '15 at 18:14
  • @pizza well spotted! This is the first time I've seen a question closed by "community", shouldn't it have the OP's name instead? (And there I was worrying about the injustices of the world...) – Mari-Lou A Apr 14 '15 at 18:21

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