They vs. Their

grammatical gender possessive determiners subject pronouns their they

'They' and 'them' are both refer to a group of people, but they function differently in a sentence because they take different grammatical roles.

"They" vs. "Their" in the English Grammar

Main Similarity and Difference

'They' and 'their' are both third-person plural personal pronouns. But one of them is a subject pronoun and the other is considered a determiner.

'They': Subject Pronoun

'They' is a third-person subject pronoun. 'They' refers to a group of people, animals, or things.

They are our guests for this weekend.

Here, 'they' refers to a group of people.

They can kill a giraffe if they attack together.

Here, 'they' refers to a group of animals, for example a pride of lionesses.

The Singular 'They'

Instead of using 'he' or 'she', we can use 'they' to refer to a person whose sex is not mentioned or is unknown. This is called the 'singular they'.
Many non-binary people prefer to be called by the pronoun 'they', rather than 'he' or 'she'.

Everyone needs to know they are appreciated.

'Everyone' does not specify if we're referring to men or women. Therefore, we use 'they' to include both of them equally.

Elise loves to travel around the world. They prefer to travel by train.

Although, Elise is one person, but we used 'they' to be neutral about the gender of our subject.

Generic 'They'

We can use 'they' to refer to people in general, especially when we want to say a general idea or a famous saying.

You know what they say , money solves everything.

They say a widespread disease will soon kill thousands of people.

'Their': Possessive Determiner

'Their' is the possessive form of 'they'. We use 'their' to express that something belongs to or relates to a group of people, animals, or things.

Kevin and Paula are going to name their baby 'Alice'.

Their house was so big and luxurious.

Gender Neutrality

We can also use 'their' instead of 'his' or 'her' to show that something belongs or relates to a person without specifically and explicitly saying whether that person is a man or a woman.

Every boxer should compete according to their own weight.

Everyone should sign their contract individually.

In many countries, they still eat all their meals with family members.

Comments

Singular They: Is or Are

'Singular they' is a relatively new personal pronoun that has been introduced in modern English. It's singular, but are we suppose to use singular verbs or not?

They vs. Them

'They' and 'them' are both third-person plural pronouns and refer to plural nouns. But what is their main difference? Let's find out!

They, Singular or Plural

Is 'They' a singular or a plural pronoun? The answer to this question used to be so easy. We would've said yes. But it's more complicated than that.

They vs. These or Those

'These' and 'Those' are called plural demonstratives. We use them as determiners and pronouns. But are they interchangeable with the plural pronoun 'they'?

This vs. That

'This' and 'that' are singular demonstratives. 'This' is used to point to a noun being close to us and 'that' is used to refer to something far from us.

This vs. These

'This' and 'these' are both demonstratives. They point to a specific noun in a sentence. Here we will briefly look at their similarities and differences.

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