“Hospital”, or “the hospital”?

[Chazmatazz269]

“That is the question.” Ell oh ell!
I just read an interesting article on this subject. If you go to the United States, you’ll hear “Charlie went to the hospital”. If you go to the UK, and Australia i believe, you’ll hear, “Sheila went to hospital”.
So which do you think is correct?
Let’s leave “England came first” and “there are more Americans” out of it. Justify your preference with a meaningful argument for the grammar!
I know i’m probably asking too much. So there’s a poll. 😂
I will link the article later in an update.

“Hospital” is correct

“The” or “a hospital” is correct

Neither or both; explain yourself in the comments

Updates

11 mo

Here is the article that inspired this question.

https://www.pristineword.com/grammar-to-hospital/

[purplepoppy]

I've wondered about that too. Grammarly will change it to "the hospital" but I've mostly heard people say "to hospital" or "in hospital" when speaking English. In welsh we'd include the word "the" but if I'm speaking English I'd drop it. That suggests the word "the" was recently dropped in colloquial English.

I think it might have something to do with English dialects because to is often pronounced "t' and the as "urgh" making "to the" sound as "turgh". he went turgh hospital.

The hospital would mean a specific one while to hospital could mean any hospital.

[Chazmatazz269]

Thank you so much! I honestly didn’t expect such a mindful and well worded response.

[Chazmatazz269]

https://www.pristineword.com/grammar-to-hospital/

I think you might find this interesting and informative.

[dustybiker2]

The question is asking for one perspective but with a source of two cultural bases. You could be an American living in England or vs versa, same issue. It makes the question mute. There is no correct answer.

[Chazmatazz269]

I left room for subjectivity by asking what “you” think is correct, and the article i shared in the update makes a compelling case for using both in different contexts.

[dustybiker2]

Eh. I'm British living currently in America. Same response. 😏

[Chazmatazz269]

Fair enough

[dustybiker2]

@chazmatazz269 lol

[WindAtMyBack]

As an ESL tutor, the more time I spend teaching English, the more I think grammar is bullshit.

Language is about communication. "Hospital" vs "the hospital" doesn't matter. It's for elitists in their ivory towers at Oxford and Harvard to argue about such trivial things.

For English learners it's all about vocabulary.

Charlie went hospital
Subject - verb - object is enough to communicate.

If you know a lot of nouns and verbs you can communicate. Knowing how to put them together is WAY down the list of what's important to communicate.

[Chazmatazz269]

I disagree in part.
I’m not an elitist. I didn’t go to university, let alone an ivory league skool. I am simply a word nerd and i revel in clear, effective communication. Conciseness is good too, but i’ll trade it for the former two without a second thought. To your point, i’ll simplify my words when there’s a language barrier of some kind. It does feel a bit demeaning though. I generally give everyone the benefit of the doubt before i dumb down my words.

[seeyounexttuesday]

The hospital
The Walmart
The aldis