Understanding Pronouns in English: personal, possessive, reflexive and more

Understanding which pronoun to use can be tricky. Even fluent speakers hesitate over words, unsure which one fits the sentence best.

Because pronouns are so common, you may find yourself overthinking simple choices. Is it ‘I’ or ‘me’? Should I use ‘who’ or ‘whom’? Little moments like these can build up and make you feel less confident about your English skills over time.

Pronouns don’t have to be overwhelming. Once you’ve nailed the basics, you’ll get them right nine times out of ten and stop letting errors undermine your confidence. Keep reading to learn all about different types of pronouns in English including personal, possessive and reflexive ones.

What are pronouns in English?

As the name suggests, a pronoun is a type of noun. We use them to replace regular nouns in a sentence to avoid awkward-sounding repetition.

To see what we mean, read the following two sentences aloud:

John gave John a moment to think before John finished John’s test.

John gave himself a moment to think before he finished his test.

Don’t you think the second sentence sounds a lot smoother than the first?

Pronouns need to match the gender and amount of the noun they represent. Going back to the example above, you can see we’ve only used singular masculine pronouns (he, him, his and himself) because we’re talking about one man.

There are different types of pronouns. The one you choose depends on its function in the sentence, i.e. what it’s trying to tell you about the person or thing.

Let’s dig a little deeper into the different types of pronouns and how to use them.

Personal pronouns

Personal pronouns directly represent the person or thing we want to talk about. They can be either subject or object pronouns, depending on their role in the sentence.

We use subject pronouns when the person or thing is performing the action. When this is the case, the pronoun usually comes before the main verb, e.g.

John is outside. He is making a phone call to someone.

We use object pronouns when the person or thing is the object of the action. In this case, the pronoun usually comes after the main verb, e.g.

Isn’t John on the phone with Sally? I think he’s calling her.

Possessive pronouns

Possessive pronouns show ownership or belonging. They’re all based on the possessive adjectives you see before a word so the spellings are similar.

We use possessive pronouns to replace a combination of possessive adjectives and nouns, e.g.

That is my coat.

That is mine.

Possessive adjectives can be the subject or object of a sentence, e.g.

Yours is the yellow umbrella.

I borrowed hers.

Note that English speakers rarely use the word ‘its’ as a standalone possessive pronoun. That’s because we usually use ‘it’ to talk about objects or animals.

Reflexive pronouns

We use reflexive pronouns when the noun is both the subject and the object of the sentence.

Reflexive pronouns are only used for a few specific meanings:

To show actions done to oneself, e.g.

I burnt myself on the cooker.

For emphasis, e.g.

She did all her homework herself.

With certain verbs, e.g.

Why can’t you just enjoy yourself for once?

Indefinite pronouns

We can use indefinite pronouns to refer to people, things, places and amounts without specifying what exactly.

Indefinite pronouns have prefixes with different meanings:

We use ‘every’ when we want to refer to every member of a group without exception. E.g.

Everything in the universe is made up of atoms.

We use ‘any’ when it doesn’t matter which member of the group. E.g.

Anybody is welcome to join our club.

We use ‘some’ when it’s a single member of the group but we can’t specify who or what. E.g.

Let’s go somewhere new this weekend.

And we use ‘no’ to refer to the absence of any members of a group. E.g.

Well done! Nobody failed the test.

Additionally, we can use the pronouns ‘any’, ‘some’ and ‘none’ to refer to amounts in the same way.

Spare cash? No, sorry. I don’t have any.

Some stayed behind to clean up.

I checked for messages but there were none.

Reciprocal pronouns

We use the reciprocal pronouns ‘one another’ and ‘each other’ when two or more nouns perform the same action.

E.g.

Kath and Jill helped each other.

They love one another.

As you can see, there must be multiple nouns or a plural noun at the start of the sentence. The reciprocal pronouns come after the verb.

Want to learn more about pronouns? Read our full guide on how to use relative pronouns in English.

How to avoid common pitfalls when using pronouns in English

It’s easy to make mistakes with pronouns as there are a lot of subtle differences. Words often have similar (or the same!) spelling and there are lots of complex rules.

Here are some of the most common mistakes so you know what to avoid:

Attention! In English-speaking countries, we use ‘they’ and ‘them’ when we don’t know someone’s gender and it hasn’t been indicated.

E.g.

Our manager is hiring a new receptionist. I hope they’re less lazy than the last one.

As soon as someone tells you their pronouns, it’s considered very impolite and disrespectful to use anything else.

Final Thoughts

As even fluent speakers make mistakes with pronouns, one major step forward is accepting that you’ll never be perfect. You will always get some words mixed up and confused.

The trick is to understand the basics so you can build your confidence and stop hesitating over pronouns. This can help you improve your fluency when speaking and writing.

Need more help getting to grips with pronouns? Book a lesson with Oxford House.

Glossary for Language Learners

Find the following words in the article and then write down any new ones you didn’t know.

Overthink (v): to think about something too much.

Standalone (adj): independent or able to work without support from other things.

Prefix (n): A group of letters added to the beginning of a word that changes its meaning.

Key

n = noun

v = verb

adj = adjective