: Re: Overusing "the" and "I" I'm not a native English speaker, and I find that my English writing contains too many definite article "the" when writing scientific reports, and too many "I" when writing

@Megan928

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Disclaimer: I am not a native speaker

I think these are two different questions. If you feel you use too many definite articles, that might mean your grammar is wrong. Try to think at every "the" you write whether you really mean to write about a specific object or if you mean to write about a more general case.

I also notice many native speakers writing "I" excessively. In informal settings, especially emails you write telling someone what work you did, frequent "I"s might be appropriate. However, I feel that they become more frequent because people do not use conjunctive words, and therefore the "I" often stands repetitively at the beginning of each sentence. Another problem I face in informal, but even formal settings, is the fact that English speakers seem to be little accustomed to longer sentence structures. That leads to many repetitions you do not observe in other languages, but are necessary to form proper sentences.

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