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Bob and I are working on a project. I want to refer to "Bob's work" and "my work" collectively, without referring to Bob and myself collectively. (This will be the first reference to Bob and myself in my writing.)

How do I do this, without resorting to the ungainly "Bob's and my work"?

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How about "Bob and I's work"? (^_^) –  RegDwigнt Mar 10 '11 at 15:06
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3 Answers

up vote 2 down vote accepted

You could transpose the words to "...work done by Bob and me" or "...work Bob and I did."

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Shouldn't that be "done by Bob and I"? –  Craig Walker Mar 4 '11 at 15:14
@Craig Walker: No, "Done by Bob and me" is correct. Nouns in most prepositional phrases are presented in the accusative case. Consider how strange it sounds when you leave 'Bob' out of the sentence and use the nominative case: "Done by I." –  oosterwal Mar 4 '11 at 16:06
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I would rewrite the sentence to avoid this clumsy construction and use the humble pronoun our.

Something like this would read well:

Bob and I are working on a project; our work was a spectacular example of eloquence.


The Annual Report Writing Team was composed of Bob and myself; the team's work was exemplary.

Sure, there's a way to do it without pronouns, but it'd be clumsy and would simply call attention to the language rather than the message.

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You can use

  1. Bob and I did it.
  2. Bob and I have done it.
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But I'm looking to refer to the work (noun) itself, not the action that we did. –  Craig Walker Mar 4 '11 at 15:14
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