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I had a flat in the centre of town, but I didn’t like living there, so …

Why is there no article before “town”?

(The quotation comes from Murphy’s “English grammar in use” 4th edition, page 318).

Barmar
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Zak
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5 Answers5

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That is a really interesting question!

Why indeed? You can say "center of town", "edge of town", "into town" and it's fine, but if you replace "town" with "city" (or "village" or "neighborhood" or really any similar word), you sound like Borat.

I think it's this:

town: Any more urbanized center than the place of reference

I'll be in Yonkers, then I'm driving into town to see the Knicks at the Garden tonight.

"Town" can mean urbanized areas in general, not just a specific municipality. "City" and "village" and so forth, do not have that secondary meaning: they refer to specific places and so must have an article.

In the sentence above, "town" refers to Manhattan, which is a borough of a city and not a town at all. If you substituted "the town", that would simply be wrong; Manhattan is not a town. If you substituted "the city", that would refer to New York City as a whole, which would make sense coming from Yonkers, a small city just north of New York, but people in Queens and Staten Island (suburban-like boroughs of New York) can say "going into town" to mean visiting the far-denser Manhattan.

By contrast, "country", which means a less urbanized place (as in "country road" or "country music"), still takes the definite article when used as a noun.

I am going to drive into the country.

means "I am going to drive into some rural area."

I am going to drive into a country.

is a odd way to say "I am going to drive into the territory of some nation-state."

I am going to drive into country.

is nonsense and means nothing.

J.R.
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Michael Lorton
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  • I think it's worth noting that in Australian English, "going into the city" can be used as an opposite of "going into the bush" or "going into the country" like "going into town" is, to refer to going somewhere more urbanized, usually the central area of the urban area you're located in (in one of the major cities, "the City" refers to the Central Business District). – nick012000 Mar 06 '19 at 22:04
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    @nick012000 — "the City" originally referred to "the City of London", which is not the city of London (pop. 8,787,892) but the actual City (pop.9,401), the financial district at the heart of metropolis. Presumably the Aussies picked it up from there. – Michael Lorton Mar 06 '19 at 22:49
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    It's interesting. If you live in the New York City vicinity, "into town" and "into the city" both mean the same thing -- going into Manhattan. And probably the same thing around other major cities. – Barmar Mar 07 '19 at 00:00
  • @Barmar sometimes not if there are two major cities near each other; in the San Francisco Bay Area, "the city" means San Francisco while "the town" means Oakland (and somehow the larger city of San Jose just gets omitted from discussion entirely). – user2752467 Mar 07 '19 at 00:25
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    "Town" can mean urbanized areas in general, not just a specific municipality. "City" and "village" and so forth, do not have that secondary meaning: they refer to specific places and so must have an article. I'm not convinced that's the reason they need an article. One might say "I don't enjoy life in the city," which can mean that they don't enjoy life in any city. – user2752467 Mar 07 '19 at 00:27
  • @JustinLardinois One might say "I don't enjoy life in the city," which can mean that they don't enjoy life in any city. But it requires an article, which "town" does not. "Town" has an actual figurative definition, whereas "city" does not (it can still be used figuratively, as you showcased - just not without an article). – Flater Mar 07 '19 at 10:02
  • While you can't say "in the centre of city" the alternative "in the city centre" is common. – Eric Nolan Mar 07 '19 at 12:06
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    Compare "go home", which has many related questions asked, here. Why not "go to the home", nor "go to home"? adverbials, like "going north". With "to" it's slightly different. We "go back to before". – vectory Mar 07 '19 at 19:39
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    @vectory -- what interests me is that "college" can omit the article, in American English, while in British English, "university" is the equivalent word (and "hospital"). – Michael Lorton Mar 08 '19 at 07:44
  • @Malvoli That one I understand as an uncountable abstractum describing the level of education, not the place. But it might well describe the place, on the model of town, "goodbye hometown, I'm leaving for college". That reminds me of a recent question, why "Big change is ..." without article, instead of the plural? – vectory Mar 08 '19 at 11:00
  • @vectory I think 'uncountable abstractum' is a good way of putting it. 'going to town' is an abstraction of place in the same way 'going to hospital' doesn't refer to a specific place of healthcare delivery. Listeners can draw context-specific implications of which town or which hospital, but the statement does not specify in itself. – user1908704 Mar 08 '19 at 13:06
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    My question is, how does a word get pointed to such an abstractum? No American, no matter how ill, would say, "I need to go to hospital"; he would say the hospital, even if he didn't have any specific hospital in mind. – Michael Lorton Mar 08 '19 at 16:36
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    @Malvolio Likewise, in the US we say "I'm watching television" but we wouldn't say "I'm watching performance". I think this is one of those things where there's no real logic to it. It just sounds right or it doesn't. – JimmyJames Mar 08 '19 at 17:12
  • I'm not sure I agree with the exclusion of "city" from this. As all your examples sound fine to me. Looking at my friends chat history alone I've got: "I've got a bus up city", "don't go city", "what you going city for?", "I'm at the edge of city". –  Mar 08 '19 at 19:45
  • @ClaraWest — what city do you live in? It might be regional or dialectal. – Michael Lorton Mar 08 '19 at 20:49
  • @Malvolio Milton Keynes - which, funnily enough, is a town not a city. It may be regional as MK is made up of various towns. And so seems to be used in relation to "town" to distinguish between small and big towns. (I'm happy with both my comments being deleted once the answerer has had a chance to read them. Not before that.) –  Mar 08 '19 at 21:25
  • @ClaraWest - What about "Santa Claus is coming to city"? I don't think you can should grammatical judgments based on those texts. – Hannover Fist Mar 08 '19 at 21:55
  • @HannoverFist I don't think "Santa Clause is coming to the city" sounds much better either. –  Mar 08 '19 at 22:02
  • "I am going to drive into country" could be not nonsensical, if you were discussing a plan to ram-raid a record shop. – SamBC Mar 08 '19 at 23:19
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The word "town" can be used without an article when discussing the centre or business district of a town or city whose identity is irrelevant, obvious or previously mentioned. A flat in town; going (or going up) to town; "In Town Tonight" was a long running BBC radio programme; it's nice to get out of town at the weekend.

Town

Michael Harvey
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    It could also be a town so small that the interlocutor isn't expected to know/care what town is being referred to. "Back when I worked at Buy More, I had a flat in the center of town and commuted to the suburbs." – miltonaut Mar 06 '19 at 23:47
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There is no need, as "the centre of town" is an understood phrase that might refer to any town, a specific town, or the idea of a town, depending on context. In a sense, the necessary article is in front of the phrase "centre of town".

Indeed, town often operates without any article at all in any case, centre, edge, or no specific location at all.

I'm driving into town.
I like to get out of town when I can.
She lives just in town.

It is, perhaps, just a quirk of the word.

SamBC
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  • Then why not "I'm driving into city", "I like to get out of village when I can" or "She lives just in conurbation"? – David Richerby Mar 08 '19 at 21:18
  • Because town is special. It may have it's origins in the time when town without qualification always meant one particular place, of course - London. – SamBC Mar 08 '19 at 21:46
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In this case, "town" is implied to be (or as @SamBC puts it, "behaves as") a proper noun.

For example,

  • "He owns a flat in London."
  • "He owns a flat in town."

If you owned a flat in London, were visiting Manchester and said, "I own a flat in town," then Mancunians would rightly presume that you have a flat in Manchester. If you were out in the middle of the Highlands, they'd ask which town, literally meaning a town, not the city.

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/imply

to involve or indicate by inference, association, or necessary consequence rather than by direct statement"

RonJohn
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    No, it's not. At least I don't understand it that way. I wonder why 7 people are on-board with this. A proper noun is an appropriate name, but town is still a generic word. I don't douibt however that native speakers might parse it that way, as long as there is only one "my town" in most contexts. Since it's not a proper noun, you still have to say "I'm going to visit the town", I hope you agree. – vectory Mar 07 '19 at 19:23
  • @vectory no, I don't agree, and I explained why. With examples. – RonJohn Mar 07 '19 at 19:29
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    (Again), this can't be a proper noun, because those are capitalized, formally. We are looking for formal arguments. It might well be a shortening, historically, of phrases like "London town", in which case you would be correct, but I don't know that. I believe a historic detivation is more important for the answer than after-the-fact intuition. – vectory Mar 08 '19 at 11:07
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    @vectory It is an implied proper noun. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/imply "to involve or indicate by inference, association, or necessary consequence rather than by direct statement" – RonJohn Mar 08 '19 at 13:55
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    We might say "behaves as a proper noun", if that makes it easier to stomach. I'm not sure it's the "right" analysis (in as much as that's a term that means anything in English), but it's certainly an analysis that works. – SamBC Mar 08 '19 at 23:16
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    @SamBC "behaves as a proper noun" that might be a better phrase. – RonJohn Mar 09 '19 at 01:23
  • There's a difference between being implied and to imply. Something that implies itself ... shouldn't that be explicit? Note that I don't fully agree with the capitalization rules anyway. – vectory Mar 09 '19 at 18:17
  • @vectory you're right that there's a difference: one is the present continuous passive voice, and the other is the "base form" of the verb. As for implying itself, who says it implies itself? – RonJohn Mar 09 '19 at 18:27
  • I still disagree, because I have a suspicion that the -n of town was a verbal marker of some kind, eon's ago. German, being akin to English, has several comparable adverbal constructions with "zu" (to, whence also the infinitive marker to, that works as participle marker in German), so e.g. zu fuß gehen "to walk afoot", zuhause "at home", zu Hofe "in the court", and directional zu seiner Mutter "to his Mother", which can be zu Muttern in a northern dialect, for a reason that I don't know but might be helpful here. Mother is truly understood like a proper name, or a pronoun. – vectory Mar 09 '19 at 18:37
  • @vectory "Old English tūn ‘enclosed piece of land, homestead, village’, of Germanic origin; related to Dutch tuin ‘garden’ and German Zaun ‘fence’." – RonJohn Mar 09 '19 at 18:46
  • @vectory all the other positively voted answers disagree with you. – RonJohn Mar 09 '19 at 18:47
  • No they do not disagree, they do not treat the history of it at all. Archaic colocations like that must have been quite common, "zu Grabe tragen", "zu Bette gehen", "vor Gericht ziehen", yadda yadda yadda – vectory Mar 09 '19 at 19:26
-1

The below was my poor attempt to point out what another answer successfully did. To paraphrase the Cambridge dictionary: The word "town" can be used without an article when discussing a town whose identity is obvious.

== Previous bad answer ==

It's a phrase based on the pioneer history of the United States and is shorthand for "the nearest populated place". When people are really spread out and travel is difficult, you don't need to say "I'm going in to Charlottesville" you can just say "I'm going in to town". Literally everyone that lives in the area knows what you mean and where you are going.

So, for the same reason you wouldn't say "I'm going in to the Charlottesville", you don't say "I'm going in to the town".

The phrase is still very much in use in the rural US.

Tim
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    It is not based on pioneers history - here's a bunch of examples that predate the USA - https://www.google.com/search?q=%22in+town%22&lr=lang_en&source=lnt&tbs=lr%3Alang_1en%2Ccdr%3A1%2Ccd_min%3A1%2F1%2F1000%2Ccd_max%3A7%2F3%2F1766&tbm=bks – Pete Kirkham Mar 08 '19 at 17:16
  • It has nothing to do with the USA: it's a feature of every dialect of English that I know of. – David Richerby Mar 08 '19 at 21:19
  • Sorry, I don't know the history of the word. I was trying to capture the mindset of why the term made sense. I was in a hurry and wrote a poor answer. – Tim Mar 10 '19 at 01:20