Pronouns
Pronouns are a relatively small, closed class of words that function in
the place of nouns or noun phrases. They include personal pronouns,
demonstrative pronouns, relative pronouns, interrogative pronouns, and some
others, mainly indefinite pronouns.
Personal pronouns
The personal pronouns of modern standard English, and the corresponding
possessive forms, are as follows:
Nominative
1st pers. sing. I me
myself my
mine
2nd pers. sing./pl.you youyourself/yourselves your yours
3rd pers. sing. she, he, it her, him, it herself, himself, itself her, his, its
hers, his, (rare: its)
1st pers. pl. we us ourselves ourours
3rd pers. pl. they themthemselves their theirs
The second-person forms such as you are used with both singular and
plural reference. In the Southern United States, y'all (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 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, the word you is used as
a plural 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 sex
of the referent. For example, she can be used to refer to a female person,
sometimes a female animal, and sometimes an object to which female
characteristics are attributed, such as a ship or a country. A male person, and
sometimes a male animal, is referred to using he. In other cases it can be
used. (See Gender in English.) The word it can also be used as a dummy subject,
in sentences like It is going to be sunny this afternoon.
The third-person plural forms such as they are sometimes used with
singular reference, as a gender-neutral pronoun, as in each employee should
ensure they tidy their desk. Despite its long history, this usage is sometimes
considered ungrammatical. (Seesingular they.)
The possessive determiners such as my are used as determiners together with nouns, as in my old man, some of his friends. The second possessive forms like mine are used when they do not qualify a noun: as pronouns, as in mine is bigger than yours, and as predicates, as in this one is mine. Note also the construction a friend of mine (meaning "someone who is my friend"). See English possessive for more details.
Demonstrative and interrogative pronouns
The demonstrative pronouns of English are this (plural these), and that (plural those), as in these are good, I like that. Note that all four words can also be used as determiners (followed by a noun), as in those cars. They can also then form the alternative pronominal expressions this/that one, these/those ones.
The interrogative pronouns are who, what, and which (all of them can
take the suffix -ever for emphasis). The pronoun who refers to a person or
people; it has an oblique form whom (though in informal contexts this is
usually replaced by who), and a possessive form (pronoun or determiner) whose.
The pronoun what refers to things or abstracts. The word which is used to ask
about alternatives from what is seen as a closed set: which (of the books) do
you like best? (It can also be an interrogative determiner: which book?; this
can form the alternative pronominal expressions which one and which ones.)
Which, who, and what can be either singular or plural, although who and what
often take a singular verb regardless of any supposed number. For more
information see who.
All the interrogative pronouns
can also be used as relative pronouns; see below for more details.
Relative pronouns
Main article: English relative clauses. For "who/whom" and related forms, see also Who (pronoun).
The main relative pronouns in English are who (with its derived forms whom and whose), which, and that.
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 (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).
The word that as a relative pronoun is normally found only in
restrictive relative clauses (unlike which and who, which can be used in both
restrictive and unrestrictive clauses). It can refer to either persons or
things, and cannot follow a preposition. For example, one can say the song that
[or which] I listened to yesterday, but the song to which [not to that] I
listened yesterday. The relative pronounthat is usually pronounced with a
reduced vowel (schwa), and hence differently from the demonstrative that (see
Weak and strong forms in English). If that is not the subject of the relative
clause, it can be omitted (the song I listened to yesterday).
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).
There as pronoun
The word there is used as a pronoun in some sentences, playing the role of a dummy subject, normally of an intransitive verb. The "logical subject" of the verb then appears as a complement after the verb.
This use of there occurs most commonly with forms of the verb be in
existential clauses, to refer to the presence or existence of something. For
example: There is a heaven; There are two cups on the table; There have been a
lot of problems lately. It can also be used with other verbs: There exist two
major variants; There occurred a very strange incident.
The dummy subject takes the number (singular or plural) of the logical
subject (complement), hence it takes a plural verb if the complement is plural.
In colloquial English, however, the contraction there's is often used where
there are would be expected.
The dummy subject 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? There was.
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/to
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, /ðə(r)/.
Other pronouns
Other pronouns in English are often identical in form to determiners
(especially quantifiers), such as many, a little, etc. Sometimes the pronoun
form is different, as with none (corresponding to the determiner no), nothing,
everyone, somebody, etc. Many examples are listed at Indefinite pronoun.
Another indefinite (or impersonal) pronoun is one (with its reflexive form
oneself and possessiveone's), which is a more formal alternative to generic
you.
