Spanish Grammar in English

El sintagma nominal > Ausencia del artículo

We omit the article with proper nouns:

Soy de ___ Madrid

Me llamo ___ Pedro

We must drop the article with nationalities and (unlike in English) professions:

Soy ___ español = I am ___ Spanish

Mi padre es ___ médico = My father is a doctor

Also with abstract and non countable nouns:

Sale ____ agua

Voy a comprar ____ café

Tengo ____ miedo

However, it reappears with emotion verbs (like gustar) or with adjectives that admit gradations:

Me gusta el agua (emotion verb)

Tengo un miedo terrible (fear can be more o less terrible)

We also do not put the article if we talk about an undetermined number of objects:

Escribo ____ cuentos

Veo ____ películas

We should not put any article in phrases that indicate types or categories of objects:

un programa de ___ radio (un tipo de programa)

ropa de ___ marca (un tipo de ropa)

un concierto para ___ flauta (un tipo de concierto)