FORM AND FUNCTION OF PRONOUNS

PRONOUNS IN ENGLISH

Person

Subjective case (SUBJECT)

or subject complement

after the verb ‘to be’

Objective case

(OBJECT)

Possessive case

(denotes ownership)

NB: no pronoun has an

apostrophe

Singular

1st I Me My, mine

2nd You You Your, yours

3rd He, she, it Him, her, it His, her, hers, its

Plural

1st We Us Our, ours

2nd You You Your, yours

3rd They Them Their, theirs

ENGLISH PRONOUNS

• Demonstrative

• Interrogative

• Relative

• Indefinite

• Reflexive

• Intensive

• Expletive

DEMONSTRATIVE PRONOUNS

Demonstrative pronouns ‘point to’.

• This, that, these, those, such

INTERROGATIVE PRONOUNS

Interrogative pronouns pose questions.

• Who? Whom? (for people)

• Which? What? Whose? Where?

RELATIVE PRONOUNSRelative pronouns relate to an antecedent (goes before) and join it to a modifying clause.

• Who, whoever, whom, whomever (for people and animals that have names)

• Whose (for possessive of people, animals, and things)

• Which, that (for animals and inanimate objects)

• What (an indefinite relative pronoun that stands for an undefined or unidentified antecedent)

RELATIVE PRONOUNS

‘I know what they want’.

PRONOUN PROBLEMS

• Using ‘that’ instead of ‘who’.

She’s the girl that arrived first.

He’s the one that received the prize.

• Change ‘that’ to ‘who’.

INDEFINITE PRONOUNSIndefinite pronouns refer to no one in particular.

• Whoever, everyone, everybody, everything, someone, somebody, something, anyone, anybody, anything, all, any, much more, most, both, few, many, several, no one, nobody, nothing, none, one, each, either, neither, none

• Note: ‘None’ often means ‘not any’. For instance: ‘Of all the films to have won Oscars in the last 50 years, none speaks to me as much as Annie Hall’ (Bill Walsh in The Elephants of Style).

REFLEXIVE PRONOUNSReflexive pronouns are used when the subject of the verb is also its object.

• Myself, yourself, himself, herself, itself, ourselves, yourselves, themselves

‘If he’d (Morse) made something of himself, he’d made something of himself himself, as he’d once put things’ (The Remorseful Day, Colin Dexter).

INTENSIVE PRONOUNSIntensive pronouns, also known as emphatic pronouns, are used to provide emphasis.

• Myself, yourself, himself, herself, itself, ourselves, yourselves, themselves

I, myself, witnessed the meltdown.

DISTRIBUTIVE PRONOUNS

Distributive pronouns refer to persons or things one at a time.

• Each, either, neither

Each of the students studies hard.

EXPLETIVE PRONOUNS

The expletive pronouns are ‘it’ and ‘there’. Avoid the expletive pronouns in a sentence such as:

It is their intention to go to the concert.

Use instead:

They intend to go to the concert.