Pronouns in English

Forms Standard Pronouns in formal modern English. † Rare. Full list The full set of pronouns (i.e. personal, relative, interrogative and reciprocal pronouns), along with dummies it and there, of which the status as pronouns is disputed. Nonstandard, informal, and archaic forms are in italics. • Whom and which can be the object of a fronted preposition, but who cannot: The tool with which they sew the dress and The person in whom she confides, but *The person in who she confides. That often cannot be used with a fronted preposition: ''The book is good, in that it's well written, but *The chair on that she sat. An omitted (∅) pronoun can never be the object of a fronted preposition, but can be the object of a non-fronted preposition: The chair (that) she sat on, but *The chair on (that) she sat.'' † Rare. †† Except in free or fused relative constructions, in which case what, whatever or whichever is used for a thing and whoever or whomever is used for a person: What he did was clearly impossible, Whoever you married is welcome here (see below). Distinguishing characteristics Pro-forms Pronoun is a category of words. A pro-form is not. It is a meaning relation in which a phrase "stands in" for (expresses the same content as) another where the meaning is recoverable from the context. In English, pronouns mostly function as pro-forms, but there are pronouns that are not pro-forms and pro-forms that are not pronouns. Also, dummy pronouns and interrogative pronouns are not deictic. In contrast, most noun phrases headed by common or proper nouns are not deictic. For example, a book typically has the same denotation regardless of the situation in which it is said. Syntactic functions English pronouns have all of the functions of other noun phrases: However, a predicate complement may also be in the reflexive form (e.g., ''She isn't herself today) or the independent genitive form (e.g., It's theirs''.). Determinative Only genitive pronouns may function as determinatives. Adjunct The most common form for adjuncts is the reflexive (e.g., I did it myself). Independent genitives and accusative are also possible (e.g., Only one matters, mine/me.). Dependents Like proper nouns, but unlike common nouns, pronouns usually resist dependents. They are not always ungrammatical, but they are quite limited in their use: == Undisputed subtypes ==

Personal Personal pronouns are those that participate in the grammatical and semantic systems of person (1st, 2nd, & 3rd person). They are called "personal" pronouns for this reason, and not because they refer to persons, though some do. They typically form definite NPs. The personal pronouns of modern standard English are presented in the table above. They are I, you, she, he, it, we, and they, and their inflected forms. The second-person you forms are used with both singular and plural reference. In the Southern United States, ''y'all (from you all) is used as a plural form, and various other phrases such as you guys are used in other places. An archaic set of second-person pronouns used for singular reference is thou, thee, thyself, thy, thine,'' which are still used in religious services and can be seen in older works, such as Shakespeare's—in such texts, ye and the you set of pronouns are used for plural reference, or with singular reference as a formal V-form. You can also be used as an indefinite pronoun, referring to a person in general (see generic you), compared to the more formal alternative, one (reflexive oneself, possessive ''one's''). The third-person singular forms are differentiated according to the gender of the referent. For example, she is used to refer to a woman, sometimes a female animal, and sometimes an object to which feminine characteristics are attributed, such as a ship, car or country. A man, and sometimes a male animal, is referred to using he. In other cases it can be used. (See Gender in English.) The third-person form they is used with both plural and singular referents. Historically, singular they was restricted to quantificational constructions such as Each employee should clean their desk and referential cases where the referent's gender was unknown. However, it is increasingly used when the referent's gender is irrelevant or when the referent presents as neither man nor woman. The dependent genitive pronouns, such as my, are used as determinatives together with nouns, as in my old man, some of his friends. The independent genitive forms like mine are used as full noun phrases (e.g., mine is bigger than yours; this one is mine). Note also the construction a friend of mine (meaning "someone who is my friend"). See English possessive for more details. Interrogative The interrogative pronouns are who, whom, whose, which and what (also with the suffix -ever). They are chiefly used in interrogative clauses for the speech act of asking questions. see below for more details. Relative The main relative pronouns in English are who (with its derived forms whom and whose), and which. The relative pronoun which refers to things rather than persons, as in the shirt, which used to be red, is faded. For persons, who is used (the man who saw me was tall). The oblique case form of who is whom, as in the man whom I saw was tall, although in informal registers who is commonly used in place of whom. The possessive form of who is whose (for example, the man whose car is missing); however the use of whose is not restricted to persons (one can say an idea whose time has come). This can be used without a head noun, as in ''This is Jen, a friend of whose you've already met.'' The word that is disputed. Traditionally, it is considered a pronoun, but modern approaches disagree. See below. The word what can be used to form a free relative clause – one that has no antecedent and that serves as a complete noun phrase in itself, as in I like what he likes. The words whatever and whichever can be used similarly, in the role of either pronouns (whatever he likes) or determiners (whatever book he likes). When referring to persons, who(ever) (and whom(ever)) can be used in a similar way (but not as determiners). Generic A generic pronoun is one with the interpretation of "a person in general". These pronouns cannot have a definite or specific referent, and they "cannot be used as an anaphor to another NP." The generic pronouns are one (e.g., one can see oneself in the mirror) and you (e.g., ''In Tokugawa Japan, you couldn't leave the country), with one being more formal than you''. Reciprocal The English reciprocal pronouns are each other and one another. Although they are written with a space, they're best thought of as single words. No consistent distinction in meaning or use can be found between them. Like the reflexive pronouns, their use is limited to contexts where an antecedent precedes it. In the case of the reciprocals, they need to appear in the same clause as the antecedent. == Disputed pronouns ==

Determiners Today, the English determiners are generally seen as a separate category of words, but they were traditionally viewed as adjectives when they came before a noun (e.g., some people, no books, each book) and as pronouns when they were pro-forms (e.g., ''I'll have some; I had none, each of the books). Note, however, that English has three words that share the spelling and pronunciation of one''. There can undergo inversion, Is there a test today? and Never has there been a man such as this. It can also appear without a corresponding logical subject, in short sentences and question tags: ''There wasn't a discussion, was there?'' The word there in such sentences has sometimes been analyzed as an adverb, or as a dummy predicate, rather than as a pronoun. However, its identification as a pronoun is most consistent with its behavior in inverted sentences and question tags as described above. Because the word there can also be a deictic adverb (meaning "at that place"), a sentence like There is a river could have either of two meanings: "a river exists" (with there as a pronoun), and "a river is in that place" (with there as an adverb). In speech, the adverbial there would be given stress, while the pronoun would not – in fact, the pronoun is often pronounced as a weak form, . Yesterday, today, and tomorrow These words are sometimes classified as nouns (e.g., Tomorrow should be a nice day), and sometimes as adverbs (''I'll see you tomorrow''). But they are alternatively classified as pronouns in both of these examples. Most modern grammars disagree, calling it a subordinator or a complementizer. But other is just a common noun here. Unlike pronouns, it readily takes a determiner (many others) or a relative clause modifier (others that we know). == Old English ==

Interrogative pronouns Hwā ("who") and hwæt ("what") follow natural gender, not grammatical gender: as in Modern English, hwā is used with people, hwæt with things. However, that distinction only matters in the nominative and accusative cases, as they are identical in other cases: Hwelċ ("which" or "what kind of") is inflected like an adjective. Same with hwæðer, which also means "which" but is only used between two alternatives: Personal pronouns The first- and second-person pronouns are the same for all genders. They also have special dual forms, which are only used for groups of two things, as in "we both" and "you two." The dual forms are common, but the ordinary plural forms can always be used instead when the meaning is clear. Many of the forms above bear a strong resemblance to the Modern English words they eventually became. For instance, in the genitive case, ēower became "your," ūre became "our," and mīn became "my." However, the plural third-person personal pronouns were all replaced with Old Norse forms during the Middle English period, yielding "they," "them," and "their." == Middle English ==

Middle English personal pronouns were mostly developed from those of Old English, with the exception of the third-person plural, a borrowing from Old Norse (the original Old English form clashed with the third person singular and was eventually dropped). Also, the nominative form of the feminine third-person singular was replaced by a form of the demonstrative that developed into sche (modern she), but the alternative heyr remained in some areas for a long time. As with nouns, there was some inflectional simplification (the distinct Old English dual forms were lost), but pronouns, unlike nouns, retained distinct nominative and accusative forms. Third-person pronouns also retained a distinction between accusative and dative forms, but that was gradually lost: the masculine hine was replaced by him south of the Thames by the early 14th century, and the neuter dative him was ousted by it in most dialects by the 15th. The following table shows some of the various Middle English pronouns. Many other variations are noted in Middle English sources because of differences in spellings and pronunciations at different times and in different dialects. == Notes ==