Definition of Pronoun
Pronoun can be defined as “A word that can function as a noun phrase used by itself and that refers either to the participants in the discourse (e.g. I, you ) or to someone or something mentioned elsewhere in the discourse (e.g. she, it, this).”
Explanation
A pronoun is a word that is used in place of the noun in the sentence. Pronouns are used in place of nouns in order to avoid the repetition of the same nouns in the paragraph.
Pronouns are like you, each, yourself, I, me, mine, she, he, myself, her, his, us, we, herself, ours, ourselves, it, that, they, few, who, whoever, whose, many, someone, everybody, etc.
It is one of the important parts of speech. Types of pronouns include personal, compound personal, reflexive, reciprocal, possessive, demonstrative, relative, interrogative, and indefinite pronouns.
Types of Pronoun
Various types of pronouns are described below with proper definition and examples:
It is mainly associated with the particular grammatical person (first person I, second person you and third person he, she, it). The example of personal pronoun are I, you, we, it, he, she, and they. Personal pronoun is divided into two type such as subjective pronoun (e.g. I, you, we, he, she, they, it) and objective pronoun (e.g. you, me, us, her, him, it, them). More…
Possessive pronoun is a pronoun which indicates possession. Examples of this pronoun are mine, hers, theirs, yours, our, ours, my, his, her, your, its, etc. For example: I have seen her book (in this example, the possessive pronoun ‘her’ replaces a word like Mohan’s). More…
Compound personal pronoun includes two sub-types based on different functions such as reflexive pronoun and intensive pronoun. Both of them having same forms however different functions. Examples are like myself, yourself, yourselves, ourselves, herself, itself, himself, and themselves. More…
Demonstrative pronoun is almost same like demonstrative adjective (such as that, this, such, these and those) however, only differs in the sentence structure. It takes the place of a noun or noun phrase whereas demonstrative adjective is followed by the noun.
For example:
He gave me this gift. (in this sentence ‘this’ is Demonstrative Adjective)
I love this. (in this sentence ‘this’ is Demonstrative Pronoun)
Indefinite pronoun is a pronoun which replaces nouns without specifying them. It stands for some person or thing however do not clarify for exactly whom. Such as:
Somebody has stolen my precious ring. (in this sentence, the word ‘somebody’ does not clarify the person)
Distributive pronoun is a pronoun which considers individual elements of a group or pair means shows each members of the group separately and not collectively. For example: any, each, none, either, neither and others are distributive pronouns. More…
Reciprocal pronoun is a pronoun which found in a subject-object pair. One can analyze the subject-object pair by expanding the sentence. Both, subject and object in the sentence have reciprocal relationship means if one gives, another one also gives in return, hence called as the reciprocal pronoun. For example: each other, one another, etc.
each other – They support each other. [means each (subject) supports the other (object)]
one another – We help one another in the society. (‘one’ is subject and ‘another’ is object)
Relative pronoun is a pronoun which acts as a substitute for a noun. It is used to unite clauses or phrases to a pronoun or noun. Examples of the relative pronouns are who, whoever, which, whichever, whom, whomever, that, whatever, whosoever, whatsoever, and whichsoever. We can say it a noun-substitute which performs function of a subordinating conjunction.
For example:
Whose: This is Rohan, whose book was stolen in two days ago.
That: The day has come that we have been waited for long time.
Which: This is the main problem, which we are searching solution for.
Who: I cheered my boy who wins the match.
What – Tell me what you have been decided.
Whom: Seema, whom you punished yesterday in class, is my sister-in-law.
Interrogative pronouns are like relative pronouns however differ in their function. Interrogative pronouns are used to ask questions.
For example:
Who: Who is she?
Whose: Whose is this book?
Whom: Whom do you love?
Which: Which is your house?
What: What is your religion?
Where: Where is your mother?