Forms

Distinguishing characteristics

Personal

Personal pronouns are those that participate in the grammatical and semantic systems of person (1st, 2nd, & 3rd person).^[1]: 1463 It's not that they refer to people. They typically form definite NPs.

The personal pronouns of modern standard English are presented in the table above. They are I, you, she, he, it, we, and they, and their inflected forms.

The second-person you forms are used with both singular and plural reference. In the Southern United States, y'all (from 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 second-person 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, ye and the you set of pronouns are used for plural reference, or with singular reference as a formal V-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 gender of the referent. For example, she is 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 third-person form they is used with both plural and singular referents. Historically, singular they was restricted to quantificational constructions such as Each employee should clean their desk and referential cases where the referent's gender was unknown.^[5] However, it is increasingly used when the referent's gender is irrelevant or when the referent is neither male nor female.^[6]

The dependent genitive pronouns, such as my, are used as determinatives together with nouns, as in my old man, some of his friends. The independent genitive forms like mine are used as full noun phrases (e.g., mine is bigger than yours; this one is mine). Note also the construction a friend of mine (meaning "someone who is my friend"). See English possessive for more details.

Interrogative

The interrogative pronouns are who, whom, whose, which and what (also with the suffix -ever). They are chiefly used in interrogative clauses for the speech act of asking questions.^[1]: 61 What has impersonal gender, while who, whom and whose have personal gender;^[1]: 904 they are used to refer to persons. Whom is the accusative form of who (though in most contexts this is replaced by who), while whose is the genitive form.^[1]: 464 For more information see who.

All the interrogative pronouns can also be used as relative pronouns, though what is quite limited in its use;^[7] see below for more details.

Relative

The main relative pronouns in English are who (with its derived forms whom and whose), and which.^[8]

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 (for example, 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 is disputed. Traditionally, it is considered a pronoun, but modern approaches disagree. See below.

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).

Generic

A generic pronoun is one with the interpretation of "a person in general". These pronouns cannot have a definite or specific referent, and they "cannot be used as an anaphor to another NP."^[1]: 427 The generic pronouns are one (e.g., one can see oneself in the mirror) and you (e.g., In Tokugawa Japan, you couldn't leave the country), with one being more formal than you.^[1]: 427

Reciprocal

The English reciprocal pronouns are each other and one another. Although they are written with a space, they're best thought of as single words. No consistent distinction in meaning or use can be found between them. Like the reflexive pronouns, their use is limited to contexts where an antecedent precedes it. In the case of the reciprocals, they need to appear in the same clause as the antecedent.^[7]

Determiners

Today, the English determiners are generally seen as a separate category of words, but they were traditionally viewed as adjectives when they came before a noun (e.g., some people, no books, each book) and as pronouns when they were pro-forms (e.g., I'll have some; I had none, each of the books).^[1]: 22

Dummy there

The word there is a dummy pronoun in some clauses, chiefly existential (There is no god) and presentational constructions (There appeared a cat on the window sill). 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 informal English, however, the contraction there's is often used for both singular and plural.^[10]

There 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?

The word there in such sentences has sometimes been analyzed as an adverb, or as a dummy predicate, rather than as a pronoun.^[11] 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 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)/.

Yesterday, today, and tomorrow

These words are sometimes classified as nouns (e.g., Tomorrow should be a nice day), and sometimes as adverbs (I'll see you tomorrow).^[12] But they are alternatively classified as pronouns in both of these examples.^[1]: 429 In fact, these words have most of the characteristics of pronouns (see above). In particular, they are pro-forms, and they resist most dependents (e.g., *a good today).

Relative that

Traditional grammars classify that as a relative pronoun.^[13] Most modern grammars disagree, calling it a subordinator or a complementizer.^[1]: 63

Relative that 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. Relative that 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 (in the traditional view), it can be omitted (the song I listened to yesterday).

Other pro-forms

There is some confusion about the difference between a pronoun and a pro-form. For example, some sources make claims such as the following:

We can use other as a pronoun. As a pronoun, other has a plural form, others:

• We have to solve this problem, more than any other, today
• I’ll attach two photos to this email and I’ll send others tomorrow.^[14]

But other is just a common noun here. Unlike pronouns, it readily takes a determiner (many others) or a relative clause modifier (others that we know).

Interrogative pronouns

Hwā ("who") and hwæt ("what") follow natural gender, not grammatical gender: as in Modern English, hwā is used with people, hwæt with things. However, that distinction only matters in the nominative and accusative cases, as they are identical in other cases:

Hwelċ ("which" or "what kind of") is inflected like an adjective. Same with hwæðer, which also means "which" but is only used between two alternatives:

Personal pronouns

The first- and second-person pronouns are the same for all genders. They also have special dual forms, which are only used for groups of two things, as in "we both" and "you two." The dual forms are common, but the ordinary plural forms can always be used instead when the meaning is clear.

Many of the forms above bear a strong resemblance to the Modern English words they eventually became. For instance, in the genitive case, ēower became "your," ūre became "our," and mīn became "my." However, the plural third-person personal pronouns were all replaced with Old Norse forms during the Middle English period, yielding "they," "them," and "their."