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Omission of the indefinite article to eliminate ambiguity




love between husband and wife



What is the reason that there is no article (e.g. "love between a husband and a wife") in the above? Has some kind of a rule been identified grammatically when it comes to such a case? If I were to guess I think it's because the indefinite article 'a', the purpose of that, is taking a generic sample (or 'instance') from a 'class' (the class of husbands), but in the above sentence you want to refer to the class itself... the husband class and the wife class... and not an 'instance' of them, because it just is more to the point. Do you think this is a fair reasoning? Also, a thought came to me that with the use of the indefinite article, you get a generic husband and a generic wife, which, may not necessarily love each other (for they are not a specific pair of a specific husband and a specific wife who in fact love each other).




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