Personal Pronouns

personal pronouns subject pronouns object pronouns

A personal pronoun is a word that substitutes a name in a sentence to avoid its repetition. Each personal pronoun shows us information like person or number.

Personal Pronouns in the English Grammar

While speaking or writing in English, you cannot always use people's names to refer to them; this would make your speech or writing dull and full of unnecessary repetition. You can avoid this by using personal pronouns.

What Is a Pronoun?

Basically, pronouns are substitutes for nouns; personal pronouns particularly substitute names and proper nouns and they can take the role of the subject and object in a sentence.
Take a look at this example:

Jennifer saw a cat at the shelter; she adopted it.

In this example, the pronouns 'she' and 'it' are **substitutes** for 'Jennifer' and 'cat'; 'she' is functioning as the subject of the second sentence and 'it' as the object.

How Personal Pronouns Are Categorized

Personal pronouns are categorized based on four criteria:

Person
Gender
Number
Grammatical Function (being the subject or object in the sentence)

Person

In English, each pronoun can have one of these three grammatical persons:

First-person: refers to the speaker
Second-person: refers to the person that is being addressed
Third-person: refers to a third party which is not present or not participating in the speech

Gender

For pronouns that are marked based on gender, each pronoun can have one of these three genders:

Male
Female
No-Gender (or neutral)

Number

Pronouns (and almost all nouns) are categorized into two main groups based on number:

Singular: When we are addressing one thing or person
Plural: When we are addressing more than one thing or person

Subjective Personal Pronouns

In a sentence, subject does an action, and the action of the verb happens to the object. Subjective personal pronouns, as is evident by the name, can replace the subject of a sentence. For example:

John bought a book. → He bought a book.

In this example 'John' is the subject. (He is doing the action of buying)

Subjective pronouns can be used when you know who or what you are addressing. You can see them in the following table:

Subjective Pronoun	Person	Number
I	First	Singular
You	Second	Singular
He	Third (male)	Singular
She	Third (female)	Singular
It	Third (neutral)	Singular
We	First	Plural
You	Second	Plural
They	Third	Plural

Now let's see them in action in these examples:

John bought a book. → He bought a book.

In this example we replaced 'John' with a personal pronoun. (it is third person and a man, so 'He' will be the correct choice)

I was doing the dishes.

In this example; the subject is the first person singular pronoun.

You can climb this wall.

In this example, the subject is the second person singular/plural pronoun.

Names Are Third Person

Names in sentences are almost always third-person. For the first and second person, you should always use a pronoun. Referring to yourself with a name may sound weird!

Personal Pronoun 'You'

'You' as Second Person Singular and Plural

You may have noticed that English has the same pronoun for second person singular and plural. It may look odd at first but as the second person is the person who is being addressed in the sentence, you do not need to emphasize number. In case you need to emphasize the number of people being addressed, you can use 'You all'.

You all need to work harder, if you want to succeed.

In this example, the speaker is putting emphasis on addressing all the people who hear this sentence.

Generic or Impersonal 'You'

'You' can also be used as an 'impersonal pronoun'. In this case it does not necessarily address someone, but it shows a general law or situation. Look at these examples:

One cannot smoke here. → You cannot smoke here.

In this example, 'one' refers to all the people in general.

The two sentences have the same meaning. The first one is using the impersonal pronoun 'one' which does not address anybody in particular. The second one has the same meaning, but it uses 'you' instead. (It is not particularly addressing you but stating a general rule or fact.)

Using Third-Person Pronouns

Third-person singular has three forms in subjective personal pronouns: 'he', 'she', and 'it.' This is one of the only cases in the English language in which gender plays a role in grammar. In English, the grammatical gender of a noun is usually the same as its natural gender, which means a man is male in grammar and a woman is female; however, there are some important exceptions:

1 - 'She' is generally used to refer to a girl or a woman. It is also used to refer to a car or a ship. For animals, we can use 'she' if the gender is known, especially when we want to emphasize the gender of the animal. Take a look at these examples:

I love my new Cadillac. She is such a great ride.

In this example, 'she' is referring to a car.

The Titanic was made in April 1912 and she sunk on her very first voyage.

'She' here is referring to a ship.

My sister's cat is so calm, she is always sleepy.

'She' here is referring to a female cat.

2 - 'He' is used to refer to a boy or a man, but it can also be used to refer to God. 'He' has the same rules for animals as 'she.' Take a look at the following examples:

Andrew is a workaholic. He needs to take it easy and rest for a while.

'He' here is referring to a man.

Many religions refer to God as an almighty being; they believe He can solve all problems.

'He' here is referring to God.

Using He for God

When using 'He' referring to God, you should always write it with capital letters. Even if it is in the middle of a sentence.

3 - 'It' is used to talk about objects, animals, and generally anything but humans (except for babies; before the gender of the baby is known). Pay attention to the following examples:

I like this book; I think it's really interesting.

'It' here is referring to an object.

Jason saw a sick cat; it was not in good shape.

'It' here is referring to an animal.

Chris and I are having a baby and I feel like it's a boy.

'It' here is referring to a baby.

Beware!

Using 'it' to refer to adults can be impolite, be careful when using this pronoun for people.

'It' as a Dummy Pronoun

A dummy pronoun is a pronoun that refers to nothing. It does not show or do anything; it is just there so the sentence has a subject. One of the uses of 'it' is as a dummy pronoun. It is usually used in sentences to talk about time, weather, date, etc. Take a look at the following examples:

Sam took his umbrella because it was raining.

Here, 'it' is used to talk about weather.

It was in the 1920s that America suffered from the Great Depression.

'it' is used to talk about a date.

It's 2 o'clock.

'it' is used to talk about a time.

Personal Pronoun 'They'

Using 'They' to Talk about Institutions

When you are talking about institutions, organizations, or governments, you use 'they.' In this sense, you are talking about a group but you do not know the members of the group. Therefore, you generally refer to them as 'they.' Here are some examples:

The United Nations should not stay silent. They need to take action.

'They' here is referring to an organization (The United Nations).

Amazon has a few problems with shipment; they need to fix it if they don't want to lose their customers.

'They' here is referring to a *company* (Amazon).

Using 'They' to Avoid Gender

Sometimes the speaker may not know someone's gender or the gender may not be important. In this case, 'he' and 'she' can be replaced by 'they.' Take a look at these examples:

Someone has missed their bus.

Here, the subject is singular but instead of 'he' or 'she', we use 'they' to avoid mentioning their gender.

A detective needs to know their own strengths and weaknesses.

Here, instead of using 'his' or 'her', we use 'their' to avoid gender.

Objective Personal Pronouns

Objective personal pronouns (or object pronouns) are used when we want to substitute a name that has the role of the object in a sentence. The object in a sentence is the noun that the action of the verb happens to it.

Objective Pronouns	Person	Number
Me	First	Singular
You	Second	Singular
Him	Third (male)	Singular
Her	Third (female)	Singular
It	Third (neutral)	Singular
Us	First	Plural
You	Second	Plural
Them	Third	Plural

Look at these examples:

I saw Jane today. → I saw her today.

In this example, Jane is a third-person singular and can be replaced by pronoun 'her'.

He gave his food to his friend. → He gave it to him.

In this example, 'his food' (an object) and 'his friend' (a male person) are substituted with pronouns 'it' and 'him'.

Objective Pronoun 'You'

The second-person object pronoun 'you' has the same form when singular or plural and it does not change when we are addressing a singular or plural subject or object.

I told you not to smoke here.

In this example, it has been told to the person not to smoke in the area (the action of telling happened to the pronoun 'you').

Uses of Objective Personal Pronouns Beyond Object

Objective personal pronouns do not always play the role of the object in a sentence. Some of the most important exceptions are:

1 - In existential phrases: When we want to answer short, usually in the first person singular:

Who wants to eat this food? – me.

In this example, instead of saying 'I want to eat this food', we use 'me' as a short answer.

I liked the movie. – me too.

In this example, instead of saying 'I like the movie too', we can shorten the answer and say 'me too'.

Who is going to clean this mess? – not me.

Remember, to make a negative short answer using the object pronoun, never put 'not' after the pronoun. It means we are not allowed to say 'me not.'

2 - In existential clauses: For example, when we want to introduce ourselves on the phone or show our presence:

It's me again.

Who is it? - It's me.

In these examples, 'me' is used to introduce the person.

3 - In coordinative phrases: in informal speech, when we want to use two people as subjects with the use of 'and':

Me and him are going to the theater.

In formal speech, it is better to use it in this way:

He and I are going to the theater.

Remember, we cannot say 'I and he', 'I' should be the second part of the whole subject.

Review

Personal pronouns are words such as; I, you, he, she, it, we, and they that are used to avoid unnecessary repetitions.

	roles	substitute
pronouns	subject/ object	names/ proper nouns

	person	gender	number	grammatical role
categories	first/ second/ third	male/ female/ neutral	singular/ plural	subjective pronouns/ objective pronouns

	singular	plural	generic
you	refers to only one person	refers to more than one person	is used as an impersonal pronoun

	she	he	it
Third person singular pronouns	refers to a female	refers to a male	refers to anything but human/ is used as a dummy pronoun

	singular	plural
they	is used to avoid telling genders	refers to more than one person

Demonstrative Pronouns

A demonstrative pronoun is a pronoun mostly used to point to something based on its distance from the speaker. In English, these pronouns have four forms.

Impersonal Pronouns

An impersonal pronoun does not refer to a specific person or thing. These pronouns help us talk about a thing or person without mentioning what or who they are.

Possessive Pronouns

Possessive pronouns show ownership and indicate that something belongs to someone particular. With their help, we can make a possessive phrase shorter.

Indefinite Pronouns

Indefinite pronouns refer to people or things without saying exactly who or what they are, but they give other information like entirety, amount, type, etc.

Dummy Pronouns

Dummy pronouns function grammatically as other pronouns, except they do not refer back to a person or thing like normal pronouns do.

Reflexive Pronouns

Reflexive Pronouns are used to show that the subject and object of a sentence are exactly the same person or thing or there is a direct connection between them.