Tag Archives: nominative

English 362, Chapter 8: Personal Pronouns

  • Heyo Pwips! We are on to chapter 8! In this chapter we will focus on the noun phrase. An important element of the noun phrase is the pronoun. Pronouns are substitutes for noun phrases (they take the place of a noun). There are several types of pronouns, but the set called personal pronouns are the core of this pronoun system.

Personal Pronouns:

Personal Pronouns have four aspects to their forms: Person, Gender, Number, and Case

Person refers to first-person form, second-person form, and third-person form.

Gender: The third person personal pronouns have masculine and feminine forms (he, she, his, her, him, etc.)

Number: refers to the fact that pronouns have singular and plural forms

Case: a distinction that refers to how a word functions in the sentence.

There are 3 types of case: Nominative (means the word functions as a subject in the sentence), Objective (means the word functions as an object of some kind) and Possessive (means the word indicates possession).

Now let’s look at examples of these pronoun forms:

Personal Pronouns in Nominative Case:
  • First person singular—I
  • First person, plural—we
  • Second person, singular—you
  • Second person, plural—you
  • Third person, singular—he, she, it
  • Third person, plural—they

 

Personal Pronouns in Objective Case
  • First person, singular–me
  • First person, plural—us
  • Second person, singular—you
  • Second person, plural—you
  • Third person, singular—him, her, it
  • Third person, plural—them

 

 

Personal Pronouns in Possessive Case
  • First Person, singular—my
  • First person, plural—our
  • Second person, singular—your
  • Second person, plural—your
  • Third person, singular—his, her, its
  • Third person, plural—their

Examples:

Our family turns into a flock of swindling, mafia vultures when it comes to left over dessert!

That is my pumpkin pie!

Mom put your pie in the fridge.

In my family, you have to mark your food, hide it, and play guard patrol during mealtimes.

There is a special sub-category of Possessive Pronouns: Independent Possessive Pronouns

  • First Person, singular—mine
  • First person, plural—ours
  • Second person, singular—yours
  • Second person, plural—yours
  • Third person, singular—his, hers
  • Third person, plural—theirs

These are independent because they can stand alone in a sentence and don’t have a following noun that they refer to like the previous possessive pronouns:

That pie is mine.

Yours is in the fridge.