Personal pronouns in English 

Pronoun Index :

Personal pronouns

Demonstrative pronouns

Relative pronouns

► For Interrogative pronouns see  Word order in questions


In more detail ....

1.Personal pronouns  

Personal pronouns in English are fairly easy to master. However it is important to remember that for the third person singular, the choice of pronoun depends on the gender of the antecedent:  he (etc.) if it refers to a man or male or unknown person, she if it refers to a female, and it for everything else.
      The feminine pronouns she / her / hers are only used with humans (a lady, etc.), or with a few animated or moving creatures or objects to which the English language can give a quality of femininity (examples dog, cat, boat).

      The object pronoun is also used after prepositions.

   ♣ Do not confuse possessive pronouns (used in place of a noun) with possessive adjectives - in the final column - (which precede a noun).

	Subject pronoun	Object pronoun	Poss­essive pronoun	Poss­essive adjec­tive
1st person sg.	I	me	mine	my
2nd person sg.	you	you	yours	your
3rd person sg.	he, she, it, one	him, her, it, one*	his, hers, its, –	his, her, its, one's
1st person pl.	we	us	ours	our
2nd person pl.	you	you	yours	your
3rd person pl.	they	them	theirs	their

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1.1 The specific case of one

The word one causes problems not just for students, but for linguists too. Unlike other pronouns, one can be used like a noun, to replace a previously mentioned noun. In the last example given above, we find the phrase,
one is not being used as a pronoun, since it is preceded by a determiner (their) and an adjective (old). It is not a noun either, as it has no intrinsic meaning outside of its context. Swan, in Practical English Usage defines one as a "substitute word"; others call it a "pro-form". But whaterver term we use to describe it, one is a special case.
  In examples of this type,  one behaves exactly like a noun, and can be assimilated to a count noun with regard to its usage in the sentence.

1.1.1 Indefinite pronouns

There are other pronouns similar to personal pronouns, and generally used like personal pronouns; these are indefinite pronouns or impersonal pronouns: they include words such as someone, anyone, anything, whoever, and even enough or plenty or all. .

1.1.2. Gender neutral pronouns

Sometimes we need to use a third-preson singular pronoun to refer to a person, without knowing if the person is male or female, or without wanting to specify the gender. For obvious reasons, we can't use he or she; but we can't use it either, as it is not a gender-neutral personal pronoun, but refers to an object.
   The classic solution in English is to use they / them / their as a singular pronoun : note however that while these pronouns can take on a singular meaning, they are still used in the normal way, as if they referred to a plural entity.
    Avoid using the sometimes-used "his or her" : this is not good style, even if it is just ocasionally necessary.

1.2. The expletive pronoun there

There is known as an expletive pronoun or dummy pronoun; this means that it does not refer to a noun or antecedent that has already been mentioned; it refers to a noun object or complement that has not yet been specified. It is a third person pronoun, but can be either used as a singular or as a plural, depending on the noun to which it refers. There is normally only used with the verb be, it can be used with any tense of the verb be, including be preceeded by a modal verb. Just occasionally it can be used with certain other verbs, such as go, stand or appear.
Don't confuse there and they, nor there and they're. See there, their and they're.

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