Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Pronouns
Pronouns
By Radhiatul Husna
Pronouns
Personal Pronouns
Possessive Pronouns
Relative Pronouns
Reflexive Pronouns
Reciprocal Pronouns
Personal Pronouns
Categories :
• Subject Pronouns: I, You, He, She, It, We, They; used as the subject
of a sentence.
• Object Pronouns: me, you, him, her, it, us, them; used as the
complement of a sentence.
Use a subject pronoun after the verb BE in the complement
position.
Use an object pronoun after prepositions: among, between, for,
from, of, to, with.
Examples:
• Among us men, it was he who always acted as the interpreter.
• We know that (A) in 1000 A.D. Leif Eriksson landed on the North
American coast, and that (B) him and his Norwegian companions
(C) were the first white men (D) to see the New world (the Answer:
B; It should be he).
Personal Pronouns
May be used in agreement with indefinite pronouns:
everyone, everybody, everything, someone, somebody,
something, anyone, anybody, anything, no one, nobody,
nothing.
Examples:
• Someone has left his book on the desk.
• Everyone who came to the picnic brought his or her own
food.
Possessive Pronouns
Possessive pronouns: my, your, his, her, its, our, your,
their.
Used before -ing nouns.
Used before parts of the body.
Examples:
• We can count on her helping us.
• She broke her wrist in the accident.
• Although Barney Clark lived only (A) a few months with
the artificial heart, doctors were able (B) to learn a great
deal from (C) him having (D) used it (the answer: C; It
should be his).
Relative Pronouns
Categories:
• Who: used to refer to persons as the subject of a sentence or a clause.
• Whom: used to refer to persons as the complement of a sentence or a clause.
• Which: used to refer to things.
• Whose: used to refer to inanimate objects to show possession.
• That: used to refer to persons or things.
Examples:
• Charlie Chaplin was a comedian who was best known for his work in silent
movies.
• Absolute zero, the temperature at (A) whom (B) all substances have zero thermal
energy and thus, (C) the lowest possible temperatures, (D) is unattainable in
practice (the Answer: A; It should be which).
• She was the only European whom I saw at the conference.
• Mrs. Jane teaches a class for students whose native language is not English.
• I thanked the woman that helped me.
Reflexive Pronouns
Reflexive pronouns:
myself, yourself, himself, herself, itself, ourselves, yourselves,
themselves.
Used as the complement of a sentence or a clause or as the object
of a preposition where both the subject and the complement
refer to the same person or thing.
Examples:
• You’ll have to solve your problem by yourself because I can’t help
you.
• The jaw structure of a snake permits it to eat and digest animals
much larger than itself.
• (A) According to the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, (B)
no person (C) should be compelled to be a witness against (D) him
own(the Answer: D; It should be himself).
Reciprocal Pronouns
Reciprocal pronoun: each other
May be used when the plural subject and the complement
refer to the same persons or things, they are performing a
reciprocal (mutual) act.
Examples:
• It is considered cheating when students help each other
during the tests.
• Business partners can usually sell their mutually own
property without consulting each other unless they have
agreed to a separate contract.
• The twinkling lights of the firefly (A) are signals (B) so that
the male and female of the species can (C) find (D) each to
the other(the Answer: D; It should be each other).
Exercise 1
Choose the correct answer of the following questions!
1. Although Margaret Mead had several assistants during her long investigations of Samoa, the bulk
of the research was done by _____alone.
(A) herself (C) her
(B) she (D) hers
2. When Franklin Roosevelt became very ill, his wife began to take a more active role in politics, and
many people believed that _____and the president shared his responsibilities.
(A) she (C) herself
(B) her (D) hers
3. Since the earth’s crust is much thicker under the continents, equipment would have to capable of
drilling through 100,000 feet of rock to investigate the mantle _____ .
(A) beneath them (C) beneath its
(B) beneath their (D) beneath they
4. One property of radioisotopes is that _____ decaying occurs in half-lives over a long period of
time.
(A) they (C) they’re
(B) them (D) their
5. Moby Dick is a mythical account of evil and revenge as shown by Captain Ahab’s pursuit of the
whale that had wounded ____ earlier in life.
(A) him (C) he
(B) to him (D) his
Exercise 2
Identify the error of the underline words in the following sentences!
1. John Philip Sousa, (A) who (B) many people consider the (C) greatest
composer of marches, wrote his music during the era (D) known as
the Gay 90s.
2. The Pilgrims were 102 English emigrants (A) whom, after (B) arriving
on the Mayflower, (C) became (D) the first European settlers in New
England.
3. According to the theory of natural selection, the man who was able
to use (A) the hands and feet most (B) freely (C) to work and grasp
was the one(D) who survived and evolved.
4. According to Amazon legends, men (A) were forced (B) to do all of
the household tasks for women warriors (C) who governed and
protected the cities(D) for they.
5. It was (A) her, Elizabeth I, not (B) her father, King Henry, (C) who
(D) led England into the Age of Empire.