Re: CHAT: the gay Canadian (was: "have a nice day")

John Cowan wrote:
>
> Matt Pearson wrote:
>
> > Perhaps "the X" in this case means "the individual out of some
> > (perhaps unspecified) set of individuals who is identified or
> > identifiable by virtue of being an X".
>
> That rather begs the question:  the "the" in this definition
> suggests uniqueness, but "Matt the gay Canadian" does not.
>
I thought of it as "Matt, the gay Canadian". It's specifying which Matt
we are talking about. "Matt, gay Canadian" would imply a profession,
title, or university degree, and "Matt, a gay Canadian" implies that
this Matt is the only Matt, and furthermore he is a gay Canadian. "Matt,
the gay Canadian", on the other hand, suggests that if you looked for
everyone named Matt, and everyone who was a gay Canadian, you would
hopefully find only him. It's a list, in a sense.

--
Robert