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I work as a tutor for an online English school and one student asked me this:

"In this sentence: I have the hiccups

Could it be: I Have hiccups?"

I have done a lot of research on advanced article usage but I haven't found anything even close to that. I have no idea what to say.

Any help will be appreciated. Especially if you can suggest articles about this subject.

Thanks in advance.

Edit:

It is not a duplicate to a cold vs flu / the flu discussion because talking about having "hiccups" is not the same as talking about having "flu".

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  • For your specific "condition", usage has been pretty much evenly split this past half-century. It's entirely your choice.
    – FumbleFingers
    Commented Apr 7, 2017 at 0:43
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    A couple other options: books.google.com/ngrams/…
    – htoip
    Commented Apr 7, 2017 at 0:50
  • The "the" is optional.
    – Hot Licks
    Commented Apr 7, 2017 at 1:27
  • "I have the hiccups" is a description of what's happening at the moment. To speak generally: "When I have hiccups, I sip water from the opposite side of the glass, and that usually works."
    – aparente001
    Commented Apr 7, 2017 at 1:57

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