• Narrative pronouns
• Pronouns of Being and time

In linguistics and grammar, a pronoun (abbreviated pro) is a word that substitutes for a noun or noun phrase.

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.

For pronouns in other languages :

• Hindi pronouns
• Sanskrit Pronouns
• Russian Pronouns
• German Pronouns
• Greek Pronouns
• Latin Pronouns
• Chinese Pronouns

Personal pronouns are pronouns that are associated primarily with a particular grammatical person – first person (as I =  ), second person (as you =  ), or third person (as he = , she = , it , they =   ) . Personal pronouns may also take different forms depending on number (usually singular or plural), grammatical or natural gender, case, and formality. The term “personal” is used here purely to signify the grammatical sense; personal pronouns are not limited to people and can also refer to animals and objects (as the English personal pronoun it usually does).

Frequency of personal pronouns in Serbo-Croatian Languages typically have personal pronouns for each of the three grammatical persons:

first-person pronouns normally refer to the speaker, in the case of the singular (as the English I  ), or to the speaker and others, in the case of the plural (as the English we   ).

second-person pronouns normally refer to the person or persons being addressed (as the English you  ); in the plural they may also refer to the person or persons being addressed together with third parties.

third-person pronouns normally refer to third parties other than the speaker or the person being addressed (as the English he  , she  , it, they   ).

• First person pronouns

cases	case name	SINGULAR	DUAL	PLURAL
case 1	Subject
		I	we both	we
case 2	Object
		Me	both of us	us
case 3	Dependent Possessive
		my	our	our
case 4	independent possessive
		mine	ours	ours
case 5	reflexive
		myself	ourselves	ourselves

• second person

cases	case name	SINGULAR	DUAL	PLURAL
case 1	Subject
		You	you both	you
case 2	Object
		you	you	you
case 3	Dependent Possessive
		your	your	your
case 4	independent possessive
		yours	yours	yours
case 5	reflexive
		yourself	yourselves	yourselves

• Third person

SINGULAR

cases	case name	Masculine	feminine	neuter	bisexual
case 1	Subject
		He	she	it
case 2	Object
		him	her	it
case 3	Dependent Possessive
		his	her's	it's
case 4	independent possessive
		his's	her's	it's
case 5	reflexive
		himself	herself	itself

DUAL NOTHING IN THIS CATEGORY

PLURAL

cases	case name	masculine	feminine	neuter	bisexual
case 1	Subject
		They	they	–
case 2	Object
		Them	them	–
case 3	Dependent Possessive
		their	their	–
case 4	independent possessive
		theirs	theirs	—
case 5	reflexive
		themselves	themselves	–

Personal pronouns, particularly those of the third person, may differ depending on the grammatical gender or natural gender of their antecedent or referent. This occurs in English with the third-person singular  pronouns, where (simply put) he is used when referring to a man  , she to a woman  , singular they to a non-binary person or a person whose gender is unknown, and it to something inanimate or an animal of unspecific sex. This is an example of pronoun selection based on natural gender;

Posessive pronouns

A possessive or ktetic form (abbreviated poss; from Latin: possessivus; Ancient Greek: κτητικός ktētikós) is a word or grammatical construction used to indicate a relationship of possession in a broad sense. This can include strict ownership, or a number of other types of relation to a greater or lesser degree analogous to it.

Most European languages feature possessive forms associated with personal pronouns, like the English my  , mine  , your , yours  , his  ,hers  and so on. There are two main ways in which these can be used (and a variety of terminologies for each):

, , , , , and so on.

Together with a noun, as in my car, your sisters, his boss. Here the possessive form serves as a possessive determiner. Without an accompanying noun, as in mine is red, I prefer yours, this book is his. A possessive used in this way is called a substantive possessive pronoun, a possessive pronoun or an absolute pronoun. Some languages, including English, also have possessive forms derived from nouns or noun phrases, such as Jane's, cows' and nobody else's. These can be used in the same two ways as the pronoun-derived forms: Jane's office or that one is Jane's.

It is common for languages to have independent possessive determiners and possessive pronouns corresponding to the personal pronouns of the language. For example, to the English personal pronouns I, you, he, she, it, we, they, there correspond the respective possessive determiners my, your, his, her, its, our and their, and the (substantival) possessive pronouns mine, yours, his, hers, its (rare), ours and theirs. In some instances there is no difference in form between the determiner and the pronoun; examples include the English his (and its), and informal Finnish meidän (meaning either “our” or “ours”).

In some languages, possessives are formed from nouns or noun phrases. In English, this is done using the ending -'s, as in Jane's, heaven's, the boy's, those men's, or sometimes just an apostrophe, as in workers', Jesus', the soldiers'. Note that the ending can be added at the end of a noun phrase even when the phrase does not end with its head noun, as in the king of England's; this property inclines many linguists towards the view that the ending is a clitic rather than a case ending (see below, and further at English possessive).

• Reflexive pronouns

In general linguistics, a reflexive pronoun, sometimes simply called a reflexive, is an anaphoric pronoun that must be coreferential with another nominal (its antecedent) within the same clause.

In the English language specifically, a reflexive pronoun will end in -self or -selves, and refer to a previously named noun or pronoun (myself, yourself, ourselves, themselves, etc.). English intensive pronouns, used for emphasis, take the same form

In Indo-European languages, has its origins in Proto-Indo-European. In some languages, some distinction exists between normal object and reflexive pronouns, mainly in the third person: whether one says “I like me” or “I like myself”, there is no question that the object is the same person as the subject; but, in “They like them(selves)”, there can be uncertainty about the identity of the object unless a distinction exists between the reflexive and the nonreflexive. In some languages, this distinction includes genitive forms: see, for instance, the Danish examples below. In languages with a distinct reflexive pronoun form, it is often gender-neutral.

A reflexive pronoun is normally used when the object of a sentence is the same as the subject. Each personal pronoun (such as I, you, he and she) has its own reflexive form:

I	myself
you	yourself/yourselves
he	himself
she	herself
one	oneself
it	itself
we	ourselves
they	themselves

These pronouns can also be used intensively, to emphasize the identity of whoever or whatever is being talked about:

• Jim bought himself a book (reflexive)
• Jim himself bought a book (intensive)

Intensive pronouns usually appear near and/or before the subject of the sentence.

Usually after prepositions of locality it is preferred to use a personal object pronoun rather than a reflexive pronoun:

• Close the door after you. (NOT … after yourself.)
• He was pulling a small cart behind him. (NOT … behind himself.)
• She took her dog with her. (NOT … with herself.)

• Reciprocal Pronouns

A reciprocal pronoun is a pronoun that indicates a reciprocal relationship. A reciprocal pronoun can be used for one of the participants of a reciprocal construction, i.e. a clause in which two participants are in a mutual relationship. The reciprocal pronouns of English are one another and each other, and they form the category of anaphors along with reflexive pronouns (myself, yourselves, etc.).

Reflexive versus reciprocal Reflexive pronouns are used similarly to reciprocal pronouns in the sense that they typically refer back to the subject of the sentence.

1. (1) John and Mary like themselves.
2. (2) John and Mary like each other.

The main difference between reflexives, as in example (1), and reciprocal pronouns, as in example (2), is that reflexives are used when the subject acts upon itself. Reciprocals are used when members of a group perform the same action relative to one another. Reciprocal pronouns exist in many languages. They are associated with plural noun phrases and indicate a reciprocal relationship between the members of the plural noun phrase. This means that some member (x) of the plural subject is acting on another member (y) of the subject, and that member (y) is also acting on (x), and that both x and y are members of the group denoted by the antecedent subject.

Below are examples of reciprocal pronouns and how their relationship to their antecedents contrasts to cases of reflexive pronoun relationships, and regular transitive relationships, and how they behave in relation to direct object pronouns in the same situation. Let R denote a Relation, and let the variables (for example, (x, y) ) stand for the arguments introduced by R.

• Demonstrative Pronouns

Demonstratives (abbreviated dem) are words, such as this and that, used to indicate which entities are being referred to and to distinguish those entities from others. They are typically deictic; their meaning depending on a particular frame of reference and cannot be understood without context. Demonstratives are often used in spatial deixis (where the speaker or sometimes the listener are to provide context), but also in intra-discourse reference (including abstract concepts) or anaphora, where the meaning is dependent on something other than the relative physical location of the speaker, for example whether something is currently being said or was said earlier.

Demonstrative constructions include demonstrative adjectives or demonstrative determiners, which qualify nouns (as in Put that coat on); and demonstrative pronouns, which stand independently (as in Put that on). The demonstratives in English are this, that, these, those, and the archaic yon and yonder, along with this one or that one as substitutes for the pronoun use of this or that.

Distal and proximal demonstratives Many languages, such as English and Chinese, make a two-way distinction between demonstratives. Typically, one set of demonstratives is proximal, indicating objects close to the speaker (English this), and the other series is distal, indicating objects further removed from the speaker (English that).

Other languages, like Nandi, Hawaiian, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Armenian, Serbo-Croatian, Macedonian, Georgian, Basque, Korean, Japanese, Old English and Sri Lankan Tamil make a three-way distinction.Typically there is a distinction between proximal or first person (objects near to the speaker), medial or second person (objects near to the addressee), and distal or third person (objects far from both).

Typically, one set of demonstratives is proximal, indicating objects close to the speaker (English this), and the other series is distal, indicating objects further removed from the speaker (English that).

such
that
these
this
those

• Indefinite pronouns

An indefinite pronoun is a pronoun which does not have a specific familiar referent. Indefinite pronouns are in contrast to definite pronouns.

Indefinite pronouns can represent either count nouns or noncount nouns. They often have related forms across these categories: universal (such as everyone, everything), assertive existential (such as somebody, something), elective existential (such as anyone, anything), and negative (such as nobody, nothing).

Many languages distinguish forms of indefinites used in affirmative contexts from those used in non-affirmative contexts. For instance, English “something” can only be used in affirmative contexts while “anything” is used otherwise.

1. Distributive pronouns
2. Negative pronouns indicate the non-existence of people or things. (Nobody thinks that.)
3. Impersonal pronouns normally refer to a person, but are not specific as to first, second or third person in the way that the personal pronouns are. (One does not clean one's own windows.)

DISTRIBUTIVE PRONOUNS:

A distributive pronoun considers members of a group separately, rather than collectively. They include either, neither and others.

• “to each his own” — 'each2,(pronoun)' Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary (2007)
• “Men take each other's measure when they react.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson

Indefinite pronouns are associated with indefinite determiners of a similar or identical form (such as every, any, all, some). A pronoun can be thought of as replacing a noun phrase, while a determiner introduces a noun phrase and precedes any adjectives that modify the noun. Thus all is an indefinite determiner in “all good boys deserve favour” but a pronoun in “all are happy”.

List of quantifier pronouns English has the following quantifier pronouns:

Uncountable (thus, with a singular verb form)

UNCOUNTABLE	MANTRAKSHAR	EXAMPLE SENTENCE
enough		Enough is enough
little		Little is known about this period of history.
less		Less is known about this period of history.
much		Much was discussed at the meeting.
more (also countable, plural)		More is better.
most (also countable, plural)		Most was rotten. (Usually specified, such as in most of the food.)
plenty		Thanks, that's plenty.

Countable, singular

one – One has got through. (Often modified or specified, such as in a single one, one of them, etc.)

Countable, plural

COUNTABLE	MANTRAKSHAR	EXAMPLE SENTENCE
several		Several were chosen.
few		Few were chosen.
fewer	Fewer are going to church these days.
many		Many were chosen.
more (also uncountable)		More were ignored. (Often specified, such as in more of us.)
most (also uncountable)		Most would agree.

Identical Form Quantifiers

all
both
another , other , others
any , anybody , anyone , anything
either
each,everybody , everyone , everything
neither , nobody , none , no one , nothing
one
some ,somebody ,someone , something
such
every

• Interrogative pronouns

An interrogative word or question word is a function word used to ask a question, such as what, which, when, where, who, whom, whose, why, whether and how. They are sometimes called wh-words, because in English most of them start with wh- (compare Five Ws). They may be used in both direct questions (Where is he going?) and in indirect questions (I wonder where he is going). In English and various other languages the same forms are also used as relative pronouns in certain relative clauses (The country where he was born) and certain adverb clauses (I go where he goes).

A particular type of interrogative word is the interrogative particle, which serves to convert a statement into a yes–no question, without having any other meaning. Examples include est-ce que in French, ли li in Russian, czy in Polish, ĉu in Esperanto, কি ki in Bengali, 嗎/吗 ma in Mandarin Chinese, mı/mi in Turkish, pa in Ladin, か ka in Japanese, ko/kö[1] in Finnish and (да) ли (da) li in Serbo-Croatian. Such particles contrast with other interrogative words, which form what are called wh-questions rather than yes–no questions…

• In English
• Wh-questions

Interrogative words in English include:

interrogative determiner	blissymbol	mantrakshar
which
what
whose (personal possessive determiner)
interrogative pro-form
interrogative pronoun
who
whom
whose (personal)
what
which
interrogative pro-adverb
where (location)
whither (signification / goal)
whence (source)
when (time)
how (manner)
why (reason)
whether
whatsoever (choice between alternatives)

Yes-no questions

Yes-no questions can begin with an interrogative particle, such as:

• A conjugation of be (e.g. “Are you hungry?”)
• A conjugation of do (e.g. “Do you want fries?”) - see Do-support § In questions
• A conjugation of another auxiliary verb, including contractions (e.g. “Can't you move any faster?”)

English questions can also be formed without an interrogative word as the first word, by changing the intonation or punctuation of a statement. For example: “You're done eating?”

Relative pronouns

A relative pronoun is a pronoun that marks a relative clause. It serves the purpose of conjoining modifying information about an antecedent referent.

An example is the word that in the sentence “This is the house that Jack built.” Here the relative pronoun that conjoins the relative clause “Jack built,” which modifies the noun house in the main sentence. That has an anaphoric relationship to its antecedent “house” in the main clause.

Antecedents The element in the main clause that the relative pronoun in the relative clause stands for (house in the above example) is the antecedent of that pronoun. In most cases the antecedent is a nominal (noun or noun phrase), though the pronoun can also refer to a whole proposition, as in “The train was late, which annoyed me greatly”, where the antecedent of the relative pronoun which is the clause “The train was late” (the thing that annoyed me was the fact of the train's being late).

In a free relative clause, a relative pronoun has no antecedent: the relative clause itself plays the role of the co-referring element in the main clause. For example, in “I like what you did”, what is a relative pronoun, but without an antecedent. The clause what you did itself plays the role of a nominal (the object of like) in the main clause. A relative pronoun used this way is sometimes called a fused relative pronoun, since the antecedent appears fused into the pronoun (what in this example can be regarded as a fusion of that which).

Role Other arguments can be relativised using relative pronouns:

• Subject
• Hunter is the boy who helped Jessica.
• Object complement
• Hunter is the boy whom Jessica gave a gift to.
• Prepositional object
• Jack built the house in which I now live. (Similarly with prepositions and prepositional phrases in general, for example, These are the walls between which Jack ran.)
• Possessor
• Jack is the boy whose friend built my house.

Archaic personal pronouns

Though the personal pronouns described above are the contemporary English pronouns, older forms of modern English (as used by Shakespeare, for example) use a slightly different set of personal pronouns as shown in the table. The difference is entirely in the second person. Though one would rarely find these older forms used in literature from recent centuries, they are nevertheless considered modern.

SEE : KINSHIP

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.