The Substitutes

This lesson will help you to avoid repetition of nouns in your sentence or passage. You can use other words in the place of nouns. Such words are called pronouns. We can see about pronouns in this lesson.

Sheba	Shirely, have you heard about pronouns?
Shirley	yes, of course. They are used instead of nouns.
Sheba	Then, Let's have a fun (game)
Shirley	with pleasure!
Sheba	Gary met Joe and his son. Now tell me which is the pronoun?
Shirley	Very simple. 'his' is the pronoun.
Sheba	Good! What is its case?
Shirley	Case! m... m... I don't know, man.
Sheba	O, Come on, it is in possessive case. Let's see now - My brother met me in the church. Now, point out the pronoun.
Shirley	I think ... it is ...' me'
Sheba	you are right; and 'my' is also a pronoun. me - objective case. my - possessive case.
Shirley	I am sorry, I don't know that much.
Sheba	Is it. But you can learn soon and easily too. I'll help you, dear.
Shirley	Thank you.

A. PRONOUN

Pronoun is a word used instead of a noun.

Example:

1. Stephen is an engineer. He works in London.
2. The students are writing a test. They will finish it soon.
3. Ruby is a dancer. She dances gracefully.
4. Jon said, " I am learning now".
5. The senators said, "We need an agreement".
6. I said to Katy, "you need not worry".
7. I bought a house. It is very beautiful.

B. PERSONAL PRONOUNS

We have three pronouns :

The Pronouns I, we, you, he, she, it and they are called personal pronouns because they stand for the three persons.

• First person - the person speaking.

Example:

1. I am writing.
2. We are listening

• Second person - the person spoken to.

Example:

He said to me, ' you are intelligent'.

• Third person - the person spoken of.

Example:

1. I said to him, "He is tall".
2. "She is tall".
3. "It is tall".
4. "They are tall".

C. Forms of Pronouns (Cases)

Persons	Number	Gender	Subjective	Objective/Accusative	Possessive I	Possessive II
I Person	Singular Plural	Both male and female	I We	Me Us	My Our	Mine Ours
II Person	Singular Plural	Both male and female	You	You	Your	Yours
III Person	Singular Plural	Male Female Neuter All genders	He She It they	Him Her It them	His Her Its their	His Her - theirs

Possessive Case

POSSESSIVE ADJECTIVES	POSSESSIVE PRONOUN
That is my house.	This house is mine.
We play in our garden.	That garden is ours.
Bring me your book.	This book is yours.
This is her bag.	The bag is hers.
Mr. Jacob is their father.	The house is theirs.
(They qualify the nouns)	(shows just possession)

'His' can be used both as possessive adjective and possessive pronoun.

Example:

1. This is his pen. ( possessive adjective )
2. This pen is his. ( possessive pronoun)