List of
Personal Pronouns and Question Word Type
List
of Personal Pronouns
Personal pronouns take the place
of specific nouns (the names of people, places or things). Basically, they are
used instead of a specific name to avoid repetition and to help ease the flow
of sentences.
We
usually inject personal pronouns into a sentence when the name of the noun has
been previously mentioned, so that the reader will know what is being referred
to. For example:
Richard bought a new laptop three
months ago. He absolutely loves it.
In the second sentence, there are two personal pronouns. The personal pronoun
“he” takes the place of “Richard” while the personal pronoun “it” takes the
place of “laptop.”
In
this article you can review a list of personal pronouns, as well as examples of
their various uses.
Types of Personal Pronouns
There are two types of personal pronouns:
subject and object. Subject Pronouns – Subject pronouns (I, You, He, She, It,
They, We) replace the name of the subject in the sentence. Example: Mrs. Yen
did not come to school yesterday. She had to go to the doctor. “Mrs. Yen” is
the subject and “she” is the subject pronoun.
Object Pronouns – Object
pronouns (Me, You, Him, Her, It, Us, Them) take the place of the object in the
sentence (the noun that receives the action in a sentence). Example: After
Colleen bought a bike, it got stolen within a week, “it” is the object pronoun
used to replace “bike.”
Selecting Personal Pronouns
Personal pronouns help us to
avoid constantly repeating the same noun over and over. The noun that is
replaced is called the antecedent. Paying close attention to the antecedent
will help you choose the correct personal pronoun.
Example: President Obama delivered a
speech on health care reform. He spoke for more than an hour. “President Obama”
is the antecedent to the personal pronoun “he.”
To avoid confusion in sentences,
it is important to choose the right personal pronoun that agrees in number
(singular or plural), person (first, second, or third person), gender
(masculine, feminine, neuter), and case (subject, object, possessive).
I or Me?
Another source of headache is
the use of the subject pronoun “I” and the object pronoun “me.”
Example:
Jennifer and I are meeting in San Francisco in July. Why not Jennifer and me?
Because “I” is part of the subject of the sentence.
Example: They gave the promotion to me. Why not I? Because “me” is the object
of the sentence.
Additional Resources on Pronouns
Take a personal pronoun quiz at ESLdesk and ESLPartyland.
The University of Ottawa Writing Centre has a good overview of pronouns.
BBC Skillswise has a load of personal pronoun activities (worksheets, games,
quizzes).
This article is one of many resources on YourDictionary on the subject of
pronouns.
Question Types
There
are three basic question types:
·
Yes/No:
the answer is “yes or no”
·
Question-word:
the answer is “information”
·
Choice:
the answer is “in the question”
We
look at these in more detail below.
Yes/No questions
Sometimes
the only answer that we need is yes or no. Look at these examples:
|
auxiliary verb
|
subject
|
not
|
main verb
|
|
answer:
yes or no
|
|
Do
|
you
|
|
want
|
dinner?
|
Yes, I do.
|
|
Can
|
you
|
|
drive?
|
|
No, I can’t.
|
|
Has
|
she
|
not
|
finished
|
her work?
|
Yes, she has.
|
|
Did
|
they
|
|
go
|
home?
|
No, they didn’t.
|
Exception! Main verb be in Present Simple and Past Simple:
|
main verb be
|
subject
|
|
|
Is
|
Anne
|
French?
|
|
Was
|
Ram
|
at home?
|
Question-word questions
Sometimes we want more than yes or
no for an answer. When asking for information, we usually place a question-word
at the beginning of the sentence. The question-word indicates the information
that we want, for example: where (place), when (time), why (reason), who (person). Look at these examples:
|
question word
|
auxiliary verb
|
not
|
subject
|
main verb
|
|
answer:
information
|
|
Where
|
do
|
|
you
|
live?
|
|
In Paris.
|
|
When
|
will
|
|
we
|
have
|
lunch?
|
At 1pm.
|
|
Why
|
has
|
n’t
|
Tara
|
done
|
it?
|
Because she can’t.
|
|
Who(m)
|
did
|
|
she
|
meet?
|
|
She met Ram.
|
|
Who*
|
has
|
|
|
run
|
out?
|
Ati has run out.
|
|
Who**
|
|
|
|
ran
|
out?
|
Ati ran out.
|
*When the question-word is who,
it acts as the subject.
**In Present Simple and Past Simple tenses, there is no auxilary verb withwho.
Exception. Main verb be in Present Simple and Past Simple:
|
question word
|
main verb be
|
subject
|
|
Where
|
is
|
Bombay?
|
|
How
|
was
|
she?
|
Choice questions
Sometimes
we give our listener a choice. We ask them to choose between two possible
answers. So their answer is (usually) already in the question. Look at these
examples:
|
auxiliary verb
|
subject
|
main verb
|
|
or
|
|
answer:
in question
|
|
Do
|
you
|
want
|
tea
|
or
|
coffee?
|
Coffee, please.
|
|
Will
|
we
|
meet
|
John
|
or
|
James?
|
John.
|
Exception. Main verb be in Present Simple and Past Simple:
|
main verb be
|
subject
|
|
OR
|
|
|
Is
|
your car
|
white
|
or
|
black?
|
|
Were
|
they
|
$15
|
or
|
$50?
|
These pages show
the three basic types of question. There are other types
of question, for example
The
following list of pronouns gives you a description of the various types
of pronouns along with examples for each type.
Personal Pronouns
These
are pronouns that refer mostly to human beings. However, the word ‘it’ does not
refer to human beings, but is a Personal Pronoun.
So,
we have a more grammatical way of defining Personal Pronouns so that we can
include the hapless it in the Personal Pronoun family.
A
Personal Pronoun is a pronoun which belongs to any of the three grammatical
persons.
The
list of pronouns which belong to this group are: I, we, you, he, she, it, and
they.
Often you’ll find Personal Pronouns divided into:
Subjective
Pronouns (I, we, you, he, she, it, they)
Objective
Pronouns (me, us, you, him, her, it, them)
Possessive
Pronouns (mine, ours, yours, his, hers, its, theirs;
with also the following ones, which strictly speaking, are adjectives – my,
our, your, her, their).
Just remember that these three so-called “types” are not really different
types.
They are just different Case forms of one type of pronoun, i.e. Personal
Pronouns.
Mobiles Subject Phone book white
pages Find Forms
Compound Personal Pronouns
There
are two sub-types of these pronouns: Reflexive pronouns and Intensive pronouns.
These two sub-types have the same forms, but different functions.
Same Forms
According
to form, we can call these pronouns Compound Personal Pronouns.
A
list of pronouns of this kind are:
myself, ourselves, yourself, yourselves, himself, herself, itself, themselves.
Different Functions
Depending
on the function, we divide the Compound Personals into the two types we
mentioned.
Reflexive Pronouns
These
pronouns function as grammatical objects or complements which mirror the
subject, as in…
herself—She blamed herself for the
mishap.
himself—He is himself today.
Intensive Pronouns
These
pronouns act as appositives of nouns or pronouns for the sake of emphasis, as
in the examples below…
yourself—You yourself wrote those
words.
themselves—This request came from the employees themselves.
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Demonstrative Pronouns
These
pronouns point out someone or something. They are identical in form to
Demonstrative Adjectives/Determiners.
The difference is that…
a Demonstrative Pronoun stands alone
(because it is a substitute for a noun or noun phrase),
but a Demonstrative Adjective is accompanied by the noun it modifies.
Here are two examples to show the difference:
She gave me this gift. (this –
Demonstrative Adjective)
I like this. (this – Demonstrative Pronoun)
More examples of Demonstrative Pronouns:
these – These are my children.
that – That is a good idea.
those – The streets of Chennai are more crowded than those of Kodaikanal.
such – Such are the people whom you once trusted.
Indefinite Pronouns
These
pronouns do stand for some person or thing, but we don’t know for exactly whom.
When
we say, “Somebody stole my watch,” we don’t know to whom the word somebody
refers to. The word somebody is an Indefinite Pronoun.
A list of pronouns of this type are…
one – One should speak the truth.
somebody – Somebody immediately called the doctor.
anybody – Anybody can solve this problem.
nobody – Nobody was present.
many – Many are called, but few are chosen.
others – Do good to others.
you – You don’t take coal to Newcastle, or coconuts to Kerala!
they – They say that a poor workman blames his tools.
Mobiles Subject Phone book white pages Find Forms
Distributive Pronouns
These
pronouns refer to individual elements in a group or a pair, one individual at a
time.
Here’s
a list of pronouns of this type…
each
– “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.”
either – You may answer either of these (two) questions first.
neither – Neither of the answers is correct.
any – You may bring any of your friends.
none – None of our students failed last year.
