The following are the different forms for personal pronouns in English:
person | subject | object |
---|---|---|
1st | I | me |
2nd | you | you |
3rd | it, he, she | it, him, her |
1st plural | we | us |
3rd plural | they | them |
Subject pronouns reflect the nouns they replace. Since English nouns rarely show gender, the pronouns "he" and "she" are generally used only for people or animals; in the case of objects or impersonal expressions, the pronoun "it" will be used.
Examples:
Predicate pronouns will always have the same form whether they are used as direct, indirect, or prepositional objects. The forms are: "me", "you", "it", "him", "her", "us", "them."
Whatever the form of the sentence (affirmative, negative, interrogative), direct objects — or the pronouns replacing them — will follow the verb:
Prepositional objects will come after their preposition:
Indirect objects will generally come after the proposition "to," except if the pronoun precedes the direct object, in which cas the proposition "to" disappears:
When a verb is followed by two or more pronouns, the following sequence is observed:
subject | verb | object | indirect object | prep. object |
---|---|---|---|---|
He | gave | it | to me | for Christmas |
Examples:
Exception: As noted above, one may omit the preposition "to" in front of an indirect object, in which cas the indirect object pronoun precedes the direct object: