Subclasses of Pronouns and their functions

Semantically all pronouns fall into the following subclasses:

I. Personal pronouns are noun-pronouns, indicating persons (I, you, he, we, and they) or non-persons (it, they) from the point of view of their relations to the speaker. Thus I (me) indicates the speaker himself, we (us) indicates the speaker together with some other person or persons, you indicates the person or persons addressed, while he, she, they (him, her, them) indicate persons (or things) which are neither the speaker nor the persons addressed to by the speaker.

Personal pronouns have the category of person, number, case (nominative and objective), and gender, the latter is to be found in the 3rd person only: masculine and feminine is he - him, she - her; neuter case-forms it - it coincide.

The nominative case form is generally usedas subject of the sentence, orpredicative in the compound nominal predicate in sentences like: It was I who did it. However, in colloquial style the form of the objective case is preferable, especially in sentences of the type. (E.g. It is me.)

Both the nominative and the objective case forms are used after the conjunctions as and than in comparative constructions:

She is as stout as I now; Last year he looked much older thanI;

She is as old asme; He was a better friend to you thanme.

The nominative case-form (as well as the objective) is used in elliptical sentences (E.g. “Who is there? – I”. “Who did it? – Me”).

The objective case form is used mainly asan object (with or without a preposition), occasionally asan attribute in prepositional phrases (E.g. Givemeyour hand; Were you speaking about me?; The better half of me protested).

The fact that semantically personal pronouns indicate persons or things restricts their functioning asadverbial modifiers. However, they may occur in this function in a prepositional phrase: (E.g. He stoodclose to me; Keep behind me).

The pronoun you implies a person, sometimes an animal, or an inanimate object, when the latter is personified (E.g. Glad to see you here, Mary; Oh, Cat, you are as clever as a man ...).

Its singular and plural forms, as well as the objective case forms, coincide (E.g. Are you in, John?; Where are you going, children?) The plural and the singular forms are differentiated only through their co-referents (denoted by John, children), as both agree with the verb in the plural.

Historically, the form youis the plural form, the singular form being thou(the objective case thee). It is no longer used nowadays except in poetry and other literary texts, where it produces a particular stylistic effect. (E.g. “So”, said the messenger, “Then thou are the spokesman.”)

The pronouns he (him), she (her) usually refer to persons, he - to male, she - to female. However some other phenomena are often referred to as he or she in poetry and fiction. Those referred to as he are: sun, wind, fear, love; those referred to as she are: earth, moon, ship, boat, car, hope, justice, modesty and some others. Also countries, especially native countries, are referred to as she: England, France, Italy, the USA, etc. (E.g. I was born in Ireland. She is the best country for me).

The pronoun they (them) is the plural form of the pronouns he, she and the personal it. Its syntactic functions are similar to those of the forms in the singular. It may be used as subject (They had no time) and as predicative (It's they who will answer first). The objective case form can also be used in these cases (That’s them). The same form is to be found in comparative constructions, as objects andadverbial modifiers:

- Do you knowthem, boy? (object)

- Try to catch up withthem. (prepositional object)

- In front of them there were seven candles. (adverbial modifier)

In addition to their usual function when they have personal meaning the pronouns we, you, they may be used asindefinite-personal, indicating people in general or a limited group of people. The difference between them is in their reference: we refers to a group of people including the speaker, you includes only the listener(s), and they excludes both the speaker and the listeners.

(E.g. Aswe know, geographic limits between dialects are not easy to establish.

You never saw such a commotion up and down the house, in all your life, as when my Uncle Podger undertook to do a job. Whenyou are tired they giveyou some pills, and in a minute you are your own self again. They say you were in the park with her? What dothey teach you there?)

The nominative case forms are used assubject orpredicative; when used as predicatives both nominative and objective case forms are possible (E.g. At last he lost his way; It was he; It is him. It keeps true also for comparative constructions: She did it better than he (him)).

The pronoun itcan perform functions varying so greatly that three statuses of this word should be differentiated. They arethe personal pronoun it, the impersonal pronoun it, andthe demonstrative pronoun it.

The Personal Pronoun It

It refers to non-persons, that is, to animals, things and abstract notions, as in: (E.g. The room was large. Somebody had already cleanedit. We had no mutual understanding, and I wantedit badly. The dog was sitting by him. Several timesit had turned and looked up at the boy).

However when speaking of pet animals, especially cats and dogs, it is usual to refer to them as he or she depending on whether they are male or female, as in (E.g. He is a very nice dog.He is my friend.He knows how I feel. It’s Pussy. She wants to go out).