determiner phrase

In linguistics, a determiner phrase (DP) is a type of phrase posited by some theories of syntax. The head of a DP is a determiner, as opposed to a noun. For example in the phrase the car, the is a determiner and car is a noun; the two combine to form a phrase, and on the DP-analysis, the determiner the is head over the noun car. The existence of DPs is a controversial issue in the study of syntax. The traditional analysis of phrases such as the car is that the noun is the head, which means the phrase is a noun phrase (NP), not a determiner phrase. Beginning in the mid 1980s, an alternative analysis arose that posits the determiner as the head, which makes the phrase a DP instead of an NP.