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FORWORD

Repeating words when we speak can be a great obstacle for the one who listens
on our speech. This tires the receptor of the message to be careful to what we say. Then, the
use of pronouns is very necessary for the harmonious understanding of the speech since it
helps us to avoid words repeating.
For this great reason, I have described in full this element of English grammar PRONOUN. In
this document, you will find easier explanation about pronouns: their kinds, their uses…

Believing that this document, that I have named pronoun, will help everyone to
speak fluently and grammatically this wonderful Shakespeare language without any useless
repeating of some words and by giving more need to the receptor to listen again on our
speech. I couldn’t put the final full stop of this document without saying thanks to the lord.

Also, to Mr MIRADI IMPERVIOUS MAMINGI The Mazumbist, ALAM WAZAYA The

King and Mr DADY DINDANDA Stray bullet.
 I. INRODUCTION

A pronoun is a word that takes the place of a noun or a noun phrase. Therefore,we use
pronoun instead of a noun or a noun phrase.
e.g
 My mother phoned jack to come back
 She phoned him to come back
In that phrase,the pronoun she takes the place of the noun phrase MY MOTHER and he
pronoun HIM instead of the noun JACK.
USE We also use pronouns to avoid the reapet of a lot of nouns into the sentence.
e.g
 do you like the manager ? no,i don’t like the manager,the manager is not
friendly.
with pronouns,we can replace the noun manager by a suitable pronoun. Like this we say : do
you like the manager ? no, i don’t like him,he is not friendly.
NOTE In conversation the speaker normally use pronouns to address each other.
e.g
 I speak to you Do you speak to me ?
NOTE But to make opinion clear,we start with nouns and then we move them on.
To use pronouns
By NOUN we really mean : noun (food) name (james),geround (repeating) and noun phrase
(twelve red roses).
The word or phrase that the replaces is called ANTECEDENT of the pronoun.
Here are examples of noun phrases and the pronouns that could replace them
Noun phrase Pronouns
 The car It
 JUNIOR MBEMBA He
 Almost all french people They
 WABA and KANA We
TYPES OF PRONOUNS
Pronouns can be divided into numerous categories including :
 PERSONAL PRONOUNS
 DEMONSTRACTIVE PRONOUNS
 POSSESSIVE PRONOUNS
 INTERROGATIVE PRONOUNS
 RELATIVE PRONOUNS
 INDEFINITE PRONOUNS
 REFLEXIVE PRONOUNS
I.PERSONAL PRONOUNS
Personal pronouns represent specific people or things. They may be used as :
The subject of a verb
The object of a verb
A.Subject pronouns
The subject of a verb does the action of the verb. The personal pronoun I,YOU,HE,SHE,IT,WE
and THEY can be used as the subject of a verb.
e.g
 PITSHOU likes dogs
 He likes dogs
In the first phrase,the proper noun PITSHOU is the subject of the verb LIKES in the second
phrase,the pronoun HE is the subject of the verb LIKE.
B.Object pronoun
The object of a verb receives the action of the verb. The personal pronouns
ME,YOU,HIM,HER,IT,US and THEM can all be used as the object of a verb.
e.g
 PITSHOU likes to stroke dogs
 He likes to stroke them
In the first sentence,the noun DOGS is the object of the verb STROKE and in the second
sentence, the pronoun THEM takes the place of DOGS and is the object of the verb STROKE.
We use personal pronouns by depending on :number,person,gender and case

SINGULAR PLURAL
SUBJECT OBJECT SUBJECT OBJECT
1.Perso I ME WE US
n
2.Perso YOU YOU YOU YOU
e.g n
 3.Perso HE,SHE,I HIM,HER,I THEY THEM BULLET calls winner
n T T and JOHN
 He calls them
 Students asked questions to their teachers
 They asked them questions
NOTICE When we talk about a single thing, we almost use IT however,they are a few
exceptions : we may sometimes refer to an animal, we use HE/HIM or SHE/HER especially if
the animal is domesticated.
In grammar, the person who is speaking is the first person,the person spoken to is the second
person and the spoken is the third person.
II.DEMONSTRATIVE PRONOUNS
Demonstrative pronouns are used to point out things or persons. We have four
demonstrative pronouns in english : THIS,THESE,THAT and THOSE.
THIS and THESE are used to demonstrate things or people that are near you(near in or time)
THAT and THOSE are used to demonstrate things or persons that are far from you (far in
distance or time)
Here is the table of demonstrative pronouns
NEAR FAR
SINGULAR This That
PLURAL These Those

e.g
 How do you see this
  That makes me sad
 Look at this !
 Those are people killing their familly member to get opulence
 These come from china
 This is my desk
 That is my girlfriend
NOTE Don’t confuse demonstrative pronouns with demonstrative adjectives. They are
identical but, demonstrative pronouns stand alone,while demonstrative adjectives qualify
nouns.
e.g
 That smells (Dem.Pron)
 That book is good (Dem.Adj)
NOTE Normally,we use demonstrative pronouns for things only but we can also use them for
people when the person is identified.
e.g
 This is WABA speaking
 Is that WINNER ?
Here are some questions that we can ask with demonstrative pronouns : what’s this ?,is
this ?,is that ?,what are these ?,what are those ?,are these ?,are those ?
e.g
 What is that ? That’s the mecanical workshop
 What is this ? This is a dust mark
 Is this a biro ? No, it’s not
 Is that a radio ? Yes, it’s
 What are these ? These are shoes
 What are those ? Those are keys
 Are these forks ? No, these are pipes
 Are those spoons ? Yes, they are
III.POSSESSIVE PRONOUNS
The possessive pronouns are used to talk about things or persons that belong to people.
They show which owns something or someone described in a sentence, they include
MINE,YOURS,HIS,HERS,ITS,OURS and THEIRS.
We use possessive pronouns by depending on : Number,gender and person
NOTE Each possessive pronoun can be subject or object.

POSSESSIVE PRONOUN
Mine,Yours ,his,
SINGULAR Hers,its
Ours,Yours,
PLURAL Theirs

e.g
 Look at these pictures, Mine (my picture) is the big one.
 I like your flowers, Do you like mine ? (my flowers)too
  All the essays were good but his (his essay) was the best.
 Here is your car, ours (our car) is overthere.
 Her doughter are intelligent at school,but mine (my daugther) are so stupid
 He said that he has helped my parents and no yours.
 I don’t like this family’s garden but i like yours.
IV.INTERROGATIVE PRONOUNS
They are words that we use to ask questions. They represent what we don’t know
(what we are asking a question about).
In english, there are four main interrogative pronouns : who,whom,what and which but the
relative pronoun whose can also be used as an interrogative pronoun.
We use 
 Who : to refer to people
 What : to refer to specif information
 Which : when a choice needs to be made
 Whose : for possessive case
 Whom : as the object of a verb
e.g
 Who is your chef
 What are you going to do overthere ?
 Whose are these socks ?
 Who are those student ?
 What is your sister’s name ?
 Which day do you prefer to meet her ?
 Which man are you fighting tomorrow ?
 Whom did you see last time ?
NOTE Whom is the correct form when the pronoun is the object of the verb
e.g
 Whom have they killed ?
 Whom have you met ?
Nevertheless, we can use WHOM in spoken english, most native speakers say (or even
whrite) : who did you see ?
However, we can use a preposition infront of WHOM to ask question but in spoken english,
we move the preposition at the end of sentence.
e.g
 To whom are you speaking ?
 For whom do you work ?
 At whom are you laughing ?
 Whom are you speaking to ?
 Whom do you work for ?
NOTE We can also use WHO instead of WHOM
e.g
 Who did you talk with ?
 Who have you worked for ?
NOTE We sometimes use the suffix EVER to make compund pronouns (mainly
whoever,whatever and whichever). when we add EVER we use it for to emphasis, often to
show confusion or surprise.
e.g
 Whoever would want to do such a nasty thing ?
 Whatever did he say to make her cry like this ?
When we use interrogative pronouns to ask a questions, we should not forget to put the
question mark( ? ) at the end of the sentence.
V.RELATIVE PRONOUNS
Relative pronouns is a word that we use to begin a surbondinate clause. It indicates the
relationship of the subordinate clause to the rest of the sentence.
e.g
 The woman who is standing near the window is a doctor.
 The door,which was bright red, was very conspicious.
Note there are five basic relative pronouns : who,whom,whose which and that.
A subordinate clause which is introduced by a relative pronoun is called Relative clause and
there are three kinds of relative clauses :
1.Defining relative clauses
2.Non defining relative clauses
3.Connective relative clauses
1.Defining relative clauses
They describe the preceding noun in such a way as to distinguish it from other nouns of the
same class. They are essential to the dear understanding of the noun in the sentence.
e.g
 The man who told me this,refused to give me his name.
In this example, the clause who told me this is very essential to the dear understanding of
whole the sentence since it is essential,if we remove it,we’ll say : the man refused to give me
his name, that i’ll be difficult to understand.
The forms are follow :
SUBJECT OBJECT POSS.CASE
For people Who/that Whom/who Whose

For thing Which/that Which of which

e.g
 They man who robbed you has been arrested
 Only those who had booked in advance were allowed
 The man whom i saw told me to come back today
 The film is about a spy whose the wife betrayed me him
 This is the picture which caused such a sensation
 The house whose walls were made of glass was mine
 The car which i hired broke down
NOTE The object pronouns whom/who and which can be amitted
e.g
 The man i met was a blind : instead of the man whom i met was a blind.
  The lion we treated was only hungry : instead of the lion which we treated was anly
ungry.
NOTE Also, whom and which can be object of a preposition. The formal construction is
preposition+whom or which but it is more usual to move the preposition to the end
of the clause.
e.g
 The man to whom i spoke told me that he was your brother.
 The man whom i spoke to told me that he was your brother
 The ladder on which i was standing began to slip
 The ladder which i was standing on began to slip
2.Non-defining relative clause
They are placed before nouns, which are already definite. They don’t therefore define
the noun but, merely add something to it by giving some more information about it.
They can be omitted with out causing confusion also unlike definig relative clause they are
separated from their nouns by commas.
e.g
 My father, who works in a bank,hem ay be able to help you with these financial
problems.
= My father may be able to help you with these financial problems
 I gave him my phone number,which she wore on his notebook
= I gave him my phone number
The forms are as follow :
SUBJECT OBJECT POSS.CASE
For people Who Whom/who whose

For things Which Which Whose/of

which

e.g
 my neighbour, who is very pessimistic,stays there will be no apples this year
 Her dog, whose the food had been stolen, desappear.
 The T.G train,which is usually very ponctual was late today
NOTE In spoken english, we don’t usually use non-defining relative clauses
e.g
 My neighbor,who is very pessimistic, says there will be no apples this year
 My neighbor says there will be no apples this yaer.
NOTE Whom/who and which can be object of a preposition. The preposition comes before
which/whom or more informally at the end of clause and in spoken english, Who takes the
place of Whom.
e.g
 Equatorial forest, through which you’ll be driving, is larger than you think
 I told peter, who said it wasn’t his business.
2.Connective relative clauses
They don’t describe the nouns but continue the story,they are usually placed after the object
of the main verb or after the preposition+noun.
e.g
 I threw the ball to john, who threw it to bullet
 I told peter, who said it wasn’t his business
NOTE They can be replaced by and/but+he,she,…..
e.g
 I threw the ball to john and he threw it to bullet
 I told peter but he said i wasn’t his business
Other Relative pronouns
Relative pronouns such as what, whatever and whoever are normally used without
antecedent.
NOTE When what is used as a relative pronoun, it means the thing or things that
e.g
 What you say is true
 What he did was wrong
In these examples, the relative pronoun what introduces clauses what you say and what you
did such clauses are called noun clause,since they can serve some of the functions of a noun.
For instance in the preceding sentences, the clause what you say acts as the subject of the
verb is and the clause what he did acts as the subject of the verb was.
Whatever means no matter no matter what or anything which and whoever has the
meaning no matter who or anyone who.
e.g
 You can tell me whatever you like
 Let in whoever comes to the door
In these examples, the noun clauses whatever you like and whoever comes to the door act
as the objects of the verb in the main clauses.
VI.RECIPROCAL PRONOUNS
Reciprocal pronouns are words that show each of two or more subjects is acting in the same
way towards the other.
e.g
 CLEVER is talking to VOA and VOA is talking to CLEVER
We say : CLEVER and VOA are talking to each other.
They are only two reciprocal pronouns and they are both two words that are :
Each other and One another.
Each other/One another : means that each person in a group of two or move people does
something to others, and each person is the subject and the direct object.
e.g
 ZENHA and MARVITHA loved each other
 They kept looking at each other and smilling
 They are so happy together,they were created for each other
 They kissed one another
 To make progress, we should love one another.
NOTE When you use reciprocal pronoun they must be two or more people,thing or groups
involved. So we can’t use reciprocal pronouns with I,YOU(sing),HE,SHE and IT. They also be
doing the same thing.
e.g
  Bundule and esdres hate each other
 They can’t see each other
 QUESTION and VOA are teaching each other
NOTE In general, we use one another which sounds a little bit formal, less often than we use
each other also some people say that we should use one another only for three or more
people or things, but there is no real justification for this.
VII.INDEFINITE PRONOUNS
Indefinite pronouns are words that don’t refer to any specific person, thing or amount
and most of them express the idea of quantity.
e.g
 Many prefer the tea with milk
 Everybody is welcome at our society !
 Few choose to live in gombe township
Here are some typical indefinite pronouns :
all,another,anybody,someone,either,neither,several,enough,something,one,many,most,fe
w,little,other,so such,anything,each,both,none,less,somebody,nobody,everybody,…..
NOTE The pronoun THEY is considered as an indefinite pronoun when it makes an indefinite
refence.
e.g
 They are producing a lot of biere in your country.
NOTE Many indefinite pronouns also funtion as parts of speech.
e.g
 He has one job in the day and another at night (ind.pron)
 I’d like another drink, please (ind.adj)
 Many couldn’t come cause of the rain (ind.pron)
 Many people couldn’t come cause of time(ind.adj)
Most indefinite pronouns are either singular or plural,however some of them cab be singular
in o,e context and plural in another. Here are most common indefinite pronouns with their
uses :
PRONOUNS MEANINGS
Another An additional or different person of thing e.g that apple was good can i
have another ?
Anyone/anybody No matter what person e.g can anybody answers this question ?

Anything No matter what thing e.g he doctor needs to know if you have eaten
anything in the last two hours.
Each Every one of two or more persons or things e.g each has his own thoughts
Enough As much as or as many as needed e.g enough is enough

Either One of the other of two people e.g do you want tea or coffee ? i don’t
mind either is good for me
Both Two persons or things even together e.g john likes coffee but not tea, both
are good
Few A small number of people or thing e.g few couldn’t do that work
Fewer A reduced number e.g fewer are smoking these days

Many A large number of people or things e.g many have already come

Several More than two but not many e.g they all complained and several left
the meeting

VII.REFLEXIVE PRONOUNS
Reflexive pronouns are words that we often use when the action described by the ver bis
directed toward the thing referred to by the subject or the verb.
They refer to the nouns or pronouns that are the subject of the verbs
e.g
 I Washed myself throuhgly before putting one clean clothes.
 Did you hurt yourself ?
In the second phrase, the reflexive pronoun yourself indicates that the action described by
the verb directed to the pronoun I
e.g
 I myself saw what happened
 Did he solve the problem himself ?
In these examples, the reflexive pronouns myself and yourself are used to emphasize the
personal pronouns I and HE.
The reflexive pronouns are listed below :

It can be seen that in the second person that, a differentiation is made between yourself
which agrees with singular antecedents and yourselves which agrees with plural
antecedents.