Function and class of determiners
Function
Determiners are words placed in front of a noun to make it clear what the noun refers to.
The word 'people' by itself is a general reference to some group of human beings. If someone says 'these people', we know which group they are talking about, and if they say 'a lot of people' we know how big the group is.
'These' and 'a lot of' are determiners in these sentences.
Classes of Determiners
There are several classes of determiners:
Definite and Indefinite articles
the, a, an
Demonstratives
this, that, these, those
Possessives
my, your, his, her, its, our, their
Quantifiers
a few, a little, much, many, a lot of, most, some, any, enough, etc.
Numbers
one, ten, thirty, etc.
Distributives
all, both, half, either, neither, each, every
Difference words
other, another
Question words
Which, what, whose
Defining words
which, whose
The following words are pre-determiners. They go before determiners, such as articles: such and what, half, rather, quite