English teacher here. Articles in English can be really confusing but essentially we use the definite article in this situation because:
- Uniqueness: In most situations, there’s only one mirror in a room or a home that’s readily available for someone to look into.
- Generality: Similar to “going to the bathroom,” “look in the mirror” refers to the general act of using a mirror to see oneself, not interacting with any specific mirror.
Tell me you haven’t read Jonathan Strange without telling me you haven’t read Jonathan Strange 😏 obviously it’s because all mirrors are connected - as entrances to the King’s Way of old.
in my experience, people use both, but in different contexts.
“in the mirror” tends to more often refer to a metaphorical “mirror”, typically when discussing self-reflection
- “I took a look in the mirror and decided to change my ways.”
“in a mirror” tends to refer most often to actual mirrors that exist in reality, not metaphorically
- “I looked into a mirror to fix my eyeliner.”
I’ve seen people use each interchangeably, but i would consider that a common mistake of style and form, not as a common valid usage.
A fair guess, but this isn’t one of those times when a grammatical error becomes normalized through common usage.
There is no grammar rule that separates speaking literally versus metaphorically in this case.
“You have something on your face; go take a look in the mirror” is just as grammatically correct in English as “You need to take a good look in the mirror and change your ways.”
I’ve explained why this is standard usage in English in my comment here.
“You have something on your face; go take a look in the mirror” is just as grammatically correct in English
yes, but only if you’re referring to a specific mirror. so, “go look in the mirror” would be appropriate if you’re also indicating to/pointing at a mirror, or there’s been a specific mirror under discussion already (or if the audience already knew there was only one mirror they could be referring to.)
also, it’s not technically a grammatical error, but one of poor style/form.
edit: also, i’m not a fan of the “using the grammar and spelling of a 3 year-old is valid because language is fluid!” argument. bad grammar and poor style/form are just that. just because doing so may be popular doesn’t magically make it “valid”. to me, that whole argument reeks of, “I’m not wrong for being ignorant, you’re wrong for pointing out my mistake-- so it’s magically not a mistake anymore so I can avoid acknowledging ever being wrong!”
Nope, as I explained in my other comment, it’s standard usage.
In English, we often use the definite article when speaking in general about a specific activity or action that involves a non-specific object. E.g. “go to the bathroom” or “catch the bus”, or “read the newspaper”. It’s not poor form at all.
Nope, as I explained in my other comment, it’s standard usage.
you explained more or less what i did, except the whole “using the grammar and spelling of a 3 year-old is valid because language is fluid!” BS argument i outright reject–
and your claims of being an English teacher? it bears no weight here.
An argument from authority (argumentum ab auctoritate), also called an appeal to authority, or argumentum ad verecundiam, is a form of argument in which the opinion of an influential figure is used as evidence to support an argument.[1]
The argument from authority is a logical fallacy,[2] and obtaining knowledge in this way is fallible.[3][4]
so, this comment…
In English, we often use the definite article when speaking in general about a specific activity or action that involves a non-specific object. E.g. “go to the bathroom” or “catch the bus”, or “read the newspaper”. It’s not poor form at all.
and if you can’t comprehend that this is simply another way of explaining what i did, then i certainly question your claims of being an English teacher.
Lol well teaching this professionally surely makes me some form of authority (albeit of course not the authority!) on this subject.
To clarify, your original point sounded like you were making a distinction between metaphorical mirrors and actual mirrors:
“in the mirror” tends to more often refer to a metaphorical “mirror”, typically when discussing self-reflection
- “I took a look in the mirror and decided to change my ways.”
“in a mirror” tends to refer most often to actual mirrors that exist in reality, not metaphorically
- “I looked into a mirror to fix my eyeliner.”
This incorrect distinction is what I was objecting to, because of course we can use both the indefinite and definite articles to refer to either literal or figurative mirrors.
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That’s a common mistake, an argument from authority is only a fallacy if the person is not an authority in the field. Quoting Neil deGrasse Tyson on political views is an argument from authority, quoting him on astrophysics is not.
Wrong. Authority is not what makes an argument correct— facts are. And those exist regardless of any claimed authority— therefore, to argue that one’s authority makes them correct is a fallacy, for it is facts and evidence, not authority, from which truth is derived.
If Neil Degrasse Tyson said something that’s incorrect and then claimed he was correct simply because he was a physicist does not make him correct.
Thanks for playing!
The thing is that facts are not as clear cut as you think, that’s a very childish vision of the world (to think that it is always possible to differentiate a fact, don’t believe me? What am I wearing now? There is a factual answer, but you have no way of knowing it)
Plus if Neil deGrasse Tyson claims something about astrophysics and you claim he’s wrong, you better have at least someone as knowledgeable as him in astrophysics to back that claim, otherwise I’m siding with the expert on the matter.
Plus all discussions rely on the backing of experts, otherwise any discussion is impossible, I could just claim your argument is wrong because some word you used means the opposite of what you meant, your only counter argument would be to point to a dictionary, which is by your own definition an appeal to authority fallacy.
I have had people hand me a floppy disk and want me to download the Internet onto it. I have told them that that is impossible but how do they know that I’m telling them the truth?
In languages that distinguish definiteness (e.g. English) usually if you’re talking about a “kind of thing”, you can use either the definite or indefinite form and make sense. Only if you’re talking about a specific thing does the distinction matter: “a mirror” = a mirror I’m now introducing and you don’t know about yet, “the mirror” = the mirror we talked about before and you already know about; but either form can mean “mirrors in general”. There are slight stylistic differences what’s preferred in what contexts depending on the language, but in German too you can say “in den Spiegel schauen”.
My assumption would be that it’s because we don’t really look at mirrors per se but rather the reflection in them, so the definite article is indicating the fungibility of the mirror itself. This total speculation on my part though and I might be totally wrong.
I like this interpretation. Fungible is a great way to describe the function of the physical mirror in the phrasing.
I look in the mirror when I have a specific mirror in mind when I say it. Otherwise it’s a mirror.
Maybe there’s a cultural idea about mirrors being somehow “the same”. After all, a mirror shows the same thing regardless of which one it is. Or related in cultural mythology to a singular adjoining world that contains your doppelganger (in such media, you don’t usually have a separate mirror-self for every mirror, but one that can be accessed from any mirror). Also could be a turn of phrase that stuck without a good reason.
Because no matter in what mirror you look, they‘re all the same. That‘s why we say the clock or the calendar. It‘s universal.
Because there’s only one mirror world and all mirrors are windows into it.
Yes, that’s what I came here to say
We like to think English follows a consistent set of rules.
It doesn’t.
I suspect it has to do with being a sort of household appliance. Similar to the fridge, the TV, the bathtub, etc. People think about it in that sense most frequently and it becomes the common parlance.
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I can’t answer your question. But I’ll bet it’s the same reason we say we saw something “on the TV.”
I feel like that’s an elderly thing. Most people cut out the “the”
I’m not a linguist, but here’s my guess.
Take these sentences where a similar thing happens.
- “Look out the window.”
- “I’m heading to the gym.”
- “You should hold the door for people.”
- “You need a trip to the barber.”
In these cases, the noun isn’t actually that important, more than it is what you’re doing with the noun. These nouns represent the general act of doing something, and I guess since that action is a singular specific thing, we use “the”.
This applies to “Look in the mirror.” The actual mirror doesn’t really matter much. The focus is on the general act of looking at your clear reflection.
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Do you think maybe ‘a mirror’ refers to actually visually looking at a mirror and ‘the mirror’ refers to taking inventory of yourself? Unless there’s actually a mirror nearby that you’re referring to.
