Pronouns…

PRONOUNS

A pronoun is a word used in the place of a noun.

   TYPES OF PRONOUNS:

1. Personal pronouns
2. Possessive pronouns
3. Reflexive pronouns
4. Emphatic pronouns
5. Demonstrative pronouns
6. Indefinite pronouns
7. Distributive pronouns
8. Reciprocal pronouns
9. Interrogative pronouns
10. Relative pronouns

PERSONAL PRONOUNS:

 Personal pronouns are the words which stand for names of   people or things.

1. A pronoun referring to the “person speaking” is said to be of the ‘First person’.

Ex: I, me, we, us

• A pronoun referring to the ‘person spoken’ is said to be of ‘Second person’.

Ex: You

• A pronoun referring to the ‘person or thing spoken of’ is said to be of ‘Third person’.

Ex: he, him, she, her, it, they, them.

Personal pronouns

   Person                           singular               plural

   First person                         I                        we

   Second person                  you                     you

   Third person                   he, she, it              they

Cases of pronouns

  Nominative case              Accusative case                 Possessive

      (subject)                        (object)

         I                                         Me                                my          mine    

         We                                     us                                 our           ours

         You                                   you                               your         yours

         He                                      him                              his            his

         She                                    her                               her            hers

         It                                         it                                  its              its 

        They                                   them                             their           theirs

Reflexive Pronouns

The pronouns which behave like objects to the verbs but refer to the same person as the subjects of the verbs are called ‘reflexive pronouns’.

Ex: We will do it ‘ourselves’.

Emphatic pronouns

The pronouns which are used with a noun or pronoun for emphasis are called ‘emphatic pronouns’.

Ex: We ‘ourselves’ helped the old man.

DEMONSTRATIVE PRONOUNS

The words which are used to point out the object or objects to which they refer are called ‘demonstrative pronouns’.

Ex: ‘This’ is my bag.

RELATIVE PRONOUNS

The pronouns immediately follow the nouns called antecedents and are called ‘relative pronouns’. They relate the adjective clauses to the main clauses.

Ex: The gentlemen ‘who’ is speaking is our president.

Distributive pronouns

The words which refer to the persons considered individually are called ‘ distributive pronouns’. The distributive pronouns are singular in number and so are followed by singular verbs.

Ex: everyone, either, each, neither, everybody, etc.

RECIPROCAL PRONOUNS

The reciprocal pronouns express a mutual or reciprocal relationship. They are considered as single units and are also called as ‘compound personal pronouns’.

Ex: each other. One another.

INDEFINITE PRONOUNS

Indefinite pronouns do not specify the particular quantity or number.

Ex: some, anyone, somebody, nobody, many, more, much, less etc/

Interrogative pronouns

The pronouns used in questions are called ‘interrogative pronouns’.

Ex: ‘Who’ is the president of India?

RULES OF PRONOUNS

1. While confessing a fault or expressing a negative idea the sequence should be first person, second person and third person.

Ex: I, you and he violated the rules and so will be punished.

• While expressing a positive idea or praise, the sequence should be second person, third person and first person.

Ex: You, he and I are nominated for the post.

• When two singular nouns are joined and denote a singular person or thing then they take a singular pronoun. The definite article ‘the’ is placed before the first noun.

Ex: The chairman and President has given his consent to the proposal.

• When two singular nouns which are joined by ‘and’ are preceded by ‘each’ or ‘every’, they take singular pronoun.

Ex: Every girl took her seat.

• The personal pronouns like ‘yours’. ‘ours’, ‘theirs’, ‘hers’, ‘its’ are used without apostrophe.

Ex: Yours sincerely.

• When two nouns are joined by ‘either -or’, ‘neither-nor’, the pronoun depends on the second noun.

Ex: Either he or his friends have done the project.

• A pronoun should be in objective case in a sentence beginning with ‘let’.

Ex: Let him go to the movie.

• When the sentence has ‘one’ as the subject the pronoun ‘one’s’ should be used.

Ex: One should do one’s duty.

• A relative pronoun must be placed nearer its antecedent and must agree with its antecedent in number, gender and person.

Ex: This is the girl who helped me.

1. Generally, the relative pronoun in the objective case is omitted.

Ex: The boy (Whom is omitted) you wanted to punish is waiting in your room.

1. The pronouns ‘whose’, ‘whom’, ‘whom’ are generally used for persons.
2. ‘who’ is used in nominative case.

Ex: Sita is the one who is selected.

1. ‘Whom’ in the objective case.

Ex: They are the burglars whom the police caught.

1. ‘Whose’ is used in the possessive case.

Ex: This is the person whose file is missing.

1. ‘Which’ is used for small infants, small animals and objects.

Ex: This is the baby which was lost in the shopping mall.

1. This is the kitten which my friend brought me as a gift ‘that’ is used for persons, lifeless things and small animals in singular or in plural in number.

Ex: This is the mobile that is not working.

This is the boy that failed in the exam.

1. ‘Each other’ is used for two persons or things or places.

Ex: These youngsters love each other.

1. ‘One another’ is used for more than two persons or things.

Ex: These three students always disagree with one another.

1. With pronouns like ‘anybody’, ‘everyone’, ‘everybody’ etc, the pronoun of masculine or feminine gender should be used according to the context.

Ex: Every one of the girls got her set of books.