

  • I love you.
  • That reminds me of something.
  • She looked at them.
  • Take it or leave it.
  • Who would say such a thing?

Pronouns have traditionally been regarded as one of the parts of speech, but some modern theorists would not consider them to form a single class, in view of the variety of functions they perform cross-linguistically. An example of a pronoun is "you", which is both plural and singular. Subtypes include personal and possessive pronouns, reflexive and reciprocal pronouns, demonstrative pronouns, relative and interrogative pronouns, and indefinite pronouns.[1]:1–34[2]

The use of pronouns often involves anaphora, where the meaning of the pronoun is dependent on an antecedent. For example, in the sentence That poor man looks as if he needs a new coat, the antecedent of the pronoun he is dependent on that poor man.

The adjective associated with "pronoun" is "pronominal".[upper-alpha 1] A pronominal is also a word or phrase that acts as a pronoun. For example, in That's not the one I wanted, the phrase the one (containing the prop-word one) is a pronominal.[3]


Pronoun versus pro-form

Pronoun is a category of words. A pro-form is a type of function word or expression that stands in for (expresses the same content as) another word, phrase, clause or sentence where the meaning is recoverable from the context.[4] In English, pronouns mostly function as pro-forms, but there are pronouns that are not pro-forms and pro-forms that are not pronouns.[5][p. 239]

Pronouns versus Pro-forms
Example Pronoun Pro-form
1 It is a good idea.
2 I know the people who work there.
3 Who works there?
4 It is raining.
5 I asked her to help, and she did so right away.
6 JJ and Petra helped, but the others didn't.

Examples [1 & 2] are pronouns and pro-forms. In [1], the pronoun it "stands in" for whatever was mentioned and is a good idea. In [2], the relative pronoun who stands in for "the people".

Examples [3 & 4] are pronouns but not pro-forms. In [3], the interrogative pronoun who doesn't stand in for anything. Similarly, in [4], it is a dummy pronoun, one that doesn't stand in for anything. No other word can function there with the same meaning; we don't say "the sky is raining" or "the weather is raining".

Finally, in [5 & 6], there are pro-forms that are not pronouns. In [5], did so is a verb phrase, but it stands in for "help". Similarly, in [6], others is a common noun, not a pronoun, but the others stands in for this list of names of the other people involved (e.g., Sho, Alana, and Ali).





Examples of "our" as a determiner or a noun.

Linguists in particular have trouble classifying pronouns in a single category, and some do not agree that pronouns substitute nouns or noun categories.[1] Certain types of pronouns are often identical or similar in form to determiners with related meaning; some English examples are given in the table.

Possessive oursour freedom
Demonstrative thisthis gentleman
Indefinite somesome frogs
Negative noneno information
Interrogative whichwhich option

This observation has led some linguists, such as Paul Postal, to regard pronouns as determiners that have had their following noun or noun phrase deleted.[7] (Such patterning can even be claimed for certain personal pronouns; for example, we and you might be analyzed as determiners in phrases like we Brits and you tennis players.) Other linguists have taken a similar view, uniting pronouns and determiners into a single class, sometimes called "determiner-pronoun", or regarding determiners as a subclass of pronouns or vice versa. The distinction may be considered to be one of subcategorization or valency, rather like the distinction between transitive and intransitive verbs – determiners take a noun phrase complement like transitive verbs do, while pronouns do not.[8] This is consistent with the determiner phrase viewpoint, whereby a determiner, rather than the noun that follows it, is taken to be the head of the phrase. Cross-linguistically, it seems as though pronouns share 3 distinct categories: point of view, person, and number. The breadth of each subcategory however tends to differ among languages.[9]

Binding theory and antecedents

The use of pronouns often involves anaphora, where the meaning of the pronoun is dependent on another referential element. The referent of the pronoun is often the same as that of a preceding (or sometimes following) noun phrase, called the antecedent of the pronoun. The grammatical behavior of certain types of pronouns, and in particular their possible relationship with their antecedents, has been the focus of studies in binding, notably in the Chomskyan government and binding theory. In this binding context, reflexive and reciprocal pronouns in English (such as himself and each other) are referred to as anaphors (in a specialized restricted sense) rather than as pronominal elements. Under binding theory, specific principles apply to different sets of pronouns.

Example reflexive structure. Since "himself" is immediately dominated by "John", Principle A is satisfied.

In English, reflexive and reciprocal pronouns must adhere to Principle A: an anaphor (reflexive or reciprocal, such as "each other") must be bound in its governing category (roughly, the clause). Therefore, in syntactic structure it must be lower in structure (it must have an antecedent) and have a direct relationship with its referent. This is called a C-command relationship. For instance, we see that John cut himself is grammatical, but Himself cut John is not, despite having identical arguments, since himself, the reflexive, must be lower in structure to John, its referent. Additionally, we see examples like John said that Mary cut himself are not grammatical because there is an intermediary noun, Mary, that disallows the two referents from having a direct relationship.

Example pronoun structure. Since "him" is immediately dominated by "John", Principle B is violated.

On the other hand, personal pronouns (such as him or them) must adhere to Principle B: a pronoun must be free (i.e., not bound) within its governing category (roughly, the clause). This means that although the pronouns can have a referent, they cannot have a direct relationship with the referent where the referent selects the pronoun. For instance, John said Mary cut him is grammatical because the two co-referents, John and him are separated structurally by Mary. This is why a sentence like John cut him where him refers to John is ungrammatical.

Binding cross-linguistically

The type of binding that applies to subsets of pronouns varies cross-linguistically. For instance, in German linguistics, pronouns can be split into two distinct categories — personal pronouns and d-pronouns. Although personal pronouns act identically to English personal pronouns (i.e. follow Principle B), d-pronouns follow yet another principle, Principle C, and function similarly to nouns in that they cannot have a direct relationship to an antecedent.[9]



  • Third-person personal pronouns:
  • Other personal pronouns in some circumstances:
    • Terry and I were hoping no one would find us. (Terry and I is the antecedent of us)
  • Reflexive and reciprocal pronouns:
  • Relative pronouns:


English pronouns

English pronouns have a number of different syntactic contexts (Subject, Object, Possessive, Reflexive) and many features:

  • person (1st, 2nd, 3rd person);
  • number (singular/plural);
  • gender (masculine, feminine, neuter or inanimate, epicene)
Personal pronouns in standard Modern English
Person Number/Gender Subject Object Dependent possessive (determiner) Independent possessive Reflexive
First Singular I me my mine myself
Plural we us our ours ourselves
Second Singular you your yours yourself
Plural yourselves
Third Masculine he him his himself
Feminine she her hers herself
Neuter/Inanimate it its itself
Plural/Epicene they them their theirs themself / themselves
Singular/Epicene they them their theirs themself / themselves

English also has other pronoun types, including demonstrative, relative, indefinite, and interrogative pronouns:

Demonstrative Relative Indefinite Interrogative
this who / whom / whose one / one's / oneself who / whom / whose
these what something / anything / nothing (things) what
that which someone / anyone / no one (people) which
those that somebody / anybody / nobody (people)
former / latter

Personal and possessive

English personal pronouns[2]:52
Person Number Case
they them



Other distinct forms found in some languages include:

  • Second person informal and formal pronouns (the T–V distinction), like tu and vous in French. Formal second person pronouns can also signify plurality in many languages. There is no such distinction in standard modern English, though Elizabethan English marked the distinction with thou (singular informal) and you (plural or singular formal). Some dialects of English have developed informal plural second person pronouns, for instance, "y'all" (Southern American English) and you guys (American English).
  • Pronoun avoidance, where personal pronouns are substituted by titles or kinship terms. Particularly common in South-East Asia.


Reflexive and reciprocal








Relative and interrogative


Relative pronouns in English include who, whom, whose, what, which and that). They rely on an antecedent, and refer back to people or things previously mentioned: People who smoke should quit now. They are used in relative clauses.[2]:56 Relative pronouns can also be used as complementizers.




Archaic forms

Archaic personal pronouns[2]:52
Person Number Case



In English, kin terms like "mother," "uncle," "cousin" are a distinct word class from pronouns; however many Australian Aboriginal languages have more elaborated systems of encoding kinship in language including special kin forms of pronouns. In Murrinh-patha, for example, when selecting a nonsingular exclusive pronoun to refer to a group, the speaker will assess whether or not the members of the group belong to a common class of gender or kinship. If all of the members of the referent group are male, the MASCULINE form will be selected; if at least one is female, the FEMININE is selected, but if all the members are in a sibling-like kinship relation, a third SIBLING form is selected. [10] In Arabana-Wangkangurru, the speaker will use entirely different sets of pronouns depending on whether the speaker and the referent are or are not in a common moiety. See the following example:





Pulalakiya panti-rda.

3DU.KIN fight-PRES

They two [who are in the classificatory relationship of father and son] are fighting. (The people involved were a man and his wife's sister's son.)


See Australian Aboriginal kinship for more details.

Special uses

Some special uses of personal pronouns include:

  • Generic they: In China they drive on the right.
  • Gender non-specific uses, where a pronoun needs to be found to refer to a person whose gender is not specified. Solutions sometimes used in English include generic he and singular they. The singular they has gained popularity in LGBTQ+ culture to refer to those that identify as non-binary or genderqueer and as a way to refer to a person gender-neutrally. Vernacular usage of "yo" as a gender neutral pronoun has also been recorded among school students in Baltimore.[12][13]
  • Dummy pronouns (expletive pronouns), used to satisfy a grammatical requirement for a noun or pronoun, but contributing nothing to its meaning: It is raining.
  • Nosism
  • Preferred gender pronoun selected to reflect gender identity
  • Resumptive pronouns, "intrusive" personal pronouns found (for example) in some relative clauses where a gap (trace) might be expected: This is the girl that I don't know what she said.
  • Royal we, used to refer to a single person who is a monarch: We are not amused.

See also

Personal pronouns in various languages

In English
In other languages


  1. Not to be confused with prenominal, which means "before the noun". English adjectives are prenominal – the blue house— and most of the French adjectives are postnominal — la maison bleue.


  1. Bhat, Darbhe Narayana Shankara (2007). Pronouns (Paperback ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press. pp. 1. ISBN 978-0199230242.
  4. Crystal, David (1985). A dictionary of linguistics and phonetics (2nd ed.). Basil Blackwell.
  5. Huddleston, Rodney; Pullum, Geoffrey K. (2002). Cambridge grammar of the English Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  7. Postal, Paul (1966). Dinneen, Francis P. (ed.). "On So-Called "Pronouns" in English". Report of the Seventeenth Annual Round Table Meeting on Linguistics and Language Studies. Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press: 177–206.
  9. Simon, Horst J.; Wiese, Heike (2002). Pronouns - Grammar and Representation. Linguistics Today. p. 190. ISBN 9789027227737.
  10. Walsh, Michael James. 1976. The Muɹinypata Language of Northern Australia. The Australian National University.
  11. Hercus, L. A. (Luise Anna), 1926-2018. (1994). A grammar of the Arabana-Wangkangurru language, Lake Eyre Basin, South Australia. Canberra, Australia: Dept. of Linguistics, Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, Australian National University. ISBN 0-85883-425-1. OCLC 32850800.CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  12. "Yo as a Pronoun". Quick and Dirty Tips. Retrieved 2019-04-05.
  13. "Language Log: Yo". Retrieved 2019-04-05.

Further reading

  • Simon, Horst J. (2002). Pronouns - Grammar and Representation. Linguistics Today. ISBN 9789027227737.
  • Bhat, Darbhe N.S. (2007). Pronouns. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0199230242.