it
Language: English
Part of speech: pron
Pronunciation: ipa: /ɪt/
enpr: ĭt
ipa: /ɘt/
rhymes: -ɪt
ipa: /ɪt/
ipa: [ɪ̈t]
ipa: [ɪt]
rhymes: -ɪt
ipa: /ət/
ipa: [ɪ̈t]
ipa: [ɪ̈ʔ]
enpr: ət
ipa: /ət/
homophone: at stripped-by-parse_pron_post_template_fn stripped-by-parse_pron_post_template_fn
Forms: form: it
form: itself
form: its
form: they
form: them
form: hit
form: i'
form: itt
Etymology: From Middle English it, hit ( > dialectal English hit (“it”)), from Old English hit (“it”), from Proto-West Germanic *hit, from Proto-Germanic *hit (“this, this one”), from Proto-Indo-European *ḱe-, *ḱey- (“this, here”). Cognate with West Frisian it (“it”), Saterland Frisian et, 't (“it”), Dutch het (“it”), Low German it (“it”), German es (“it”). Compare also Gothic 𐌹𐍄𐌰 (ita, “it”), Latin cis (“on this”), hic (“this”). More at he.
Senses: examples: text: Take this book and put it on the shelf.
text: Take each day as it comes.
text: I found a poor little cat. It seems to be half starving.
text: It is not a pen. It is a book.
ref: 2016, VOA Learning English (public domain)
text: The Nansi District was formerly known as the "Jiaba Community", and was one of the early territories of the Taivoan, as well as where the Zou resided. Later, due to the invasion of the Siraya tribe, the community members later migrated out to regions such as Gongguan, Paoziliao (Kaohsiung County), and Daciouyuan. During the time of the Japanese occupation, because of its location at the west of the "Nanzihsian River", it was therefore renamed Nansi ("si" meaning "west"). A village and village hall were established here, under the governance of Sinhua District of Tainan Province. After the war in 1945, it was renamed Nansi Township, and was changed to Nansi District after the merging of Tainan City and County on December 25th, 2010.
ref: 2018 August 6, “Brief Introduction of Nansi”, in Nansi District Office, Tainan City, archived from the original on 16 Feb 2022:
glosses: The third-person singular neuter personal pronoun used to refer to an inanimate object, abstract entity, or non-human living thing.
examples: text: She took the baby and held it in her arms.
text: A child cannot quarrel with its elders, as I had done; cannot give its furious feelings uncontrolled play, as I had given mine, without experiencing afterwards the pang of remorse and the chill of reaction.
ref: 1847, Charlotte Brontë, chapter IV, in Jane Eyre:
text: I could only encourage Mrs. Clements to speak next of Anne's early days […] "There was nobody else, sir, to take the little helpless creature in hand," replied Mrs. Clements. "The wicked mother seemed to hate it—as if the poor baby was in fault!—from the day it was born. My heart was heavy for the child, and I made the offer to bring it up as tenderly as if it was my own."
"Did Anne remain entirely under your care from that time?"
"Not quite entirely, sir. Mrs. Catherick had her whims and fancies about it at times, and used now and then to lay claim to the child, as if she wanted to spite me for bringing it up.
ref: 1859, Wilkie Collins, The Woman in White:
text: The sky was dripping. Like a tap that a child has tried its hardest to turn off but hasn't quite managed.
ref: 2005, Marcus Zusak, The Book Thief, part 10:
glosses: A third-person singular personal pronoun used to refer to a baby or child, especially of unknown gender.
examples: text: All these things inclined her, step by step, to submit to the new discovery, whether Queen Victoria's or another's, that each man and each woman has another allotted to it for life, whom it supports, by whom it is supported, till death them do part.
ref: 1928, Virginia Woolf, Orlando, chapter 5
text: She had never seen that each human being was different, would react differently, had its own peculiar idiosyncrasies.
ref: 1959, Agatha Christie, chapter 8, in Ordeal by Innocence:
glosses: A third-person singular pronoun used to refer to an unspecified person.
examples: text: "[…] It's my belief that you don't know your own mind."
"I don't, dear," said Hulda, nestling to him.
"Why, what a puss it is!" cried Sir Philip, kissing her tenderly.
ref: 1890, George Manville Fenn, Black Blood:
text: 1897, Olive Pratt Rayner (Grant Allen), The Type-Writer Girl
She caught my eye, and laughed. “What a funny girl it is!” she cried. “You are so comical! But it isn't the least use your trying to frighten me. I can see the twinkle in your big black eyes; and I like you in spite of your trying to be horrid. Do you know, I liked you from the first moment I saw you.”
text: WILLIAM: You don't like me better?
CLARA: Indeed I do.
WILLIAM (laughing): Well, what a dear girl it is.
CLARA (flinging her arms around his neck with suddenly disclosed passion): Oh, I do love you!
ref: 1905, The Harvard Monthly, volumes 39-40, page 183:
glosses: An affectionate third-person singular personal pronoun.
examples: text: 1977-1980, Lou Sullivan, personal diary, quoted in 2019, Ellis Martin, Zach Ozma (editors), We Both Laughed In Pleasure
Next morning bought her [a drag queen] breakfast & she asked for a couple dollars to get a drink. Gave her $3, walked her to a bar. […] Some teenage boys watched us walking & began shouting. When I left her at the bar door & kissed her goodbye, they began shouting "Ugh! You kissed it!!"
text: "Oh, don't be silly. I am neither male nor female. I'm a farfel." […] "It. Refer to me as an it."
"That seems pretty rude," I said nervously.
"Not as rude as calling me a he or a she," it said.
ref: 1993, Bruce Coville, Aliens Ate My Homework, pages 72–73:
text: The individual known as Maia Arson Crimew was born as Tillie Kottmann on 7 August 1999 in Lucerne, Switzerland. Kottmann/Crimew has expressed on its website a desire to be referred to by ‘it’ pronouns (Crimew 2021), so this article will interchangeably refer to it by its preferred terms as either ‘Maia Arson Crimew’ or ‘it’.
Crimew is a well-known figure among hacking and cybersecurity circles. It has either taken credit for or been attributed to hacks from several major multinational corporations, including […]
ref: 2024 January 16, Matteo Garofalo, “Singular Purpose: Calculating the Degree of Ethno-Religious Over-representation in the USNo-Fly List”, in International Journal for Crime, Justice and Social Democracy:
glosses: A third-person singular personal pronoun used to refer to an animate referent who is transgender or non-binary.
examples: text: It's me, John.
text: Somebody wanted a drink, didn't they? Who was it?
text: It is I, your king.
glosses: Refers to someone being identified, often on the phone, but not limited to this situation.
examples: text: It is nearly 10 o’clock.
text: It’s 10:45.
text: It’s very cold today.
text: It’s lonely without you.
text: It seems so.
glosses: The impersonal pronoun, used without referent as the subject of an impersonal verb or statement (known as the dummy pronoun, dummy it or weather it).
examples: rough it
live it up
stick it out
glosses: The impersonal pronoun, used without referent, or with unstated but contextually implied referent, in various short idioms or expressions.
examples: text: After all these years, she still has it.
text: Later that night, a friend told Brady, “Still got it.” “Never lost it,” he replied. THAT WAS MOSTLY TRUE. But the 2013 season ended with the Patriots coaches wondering whether Brady's skills were in a subtle but irrevocable decline […]
ref: 2021, Seth Wickersham, It's Better to Be Feared: The New England Patriots Dynasty and the Pursuit of Greatness, Liveright Publishing, →ISBN:
glosses: The impersonal pronoun, used without referent, or with unstated but contextually implied referent, in various short idioms or expressions.
Referring to a desirable quality or ability, or quality of being successful, fashionable or in vogue.
examples: text: I caught them doing it.
text: Are you getting it regularly?
text: Is man really the only animal who does "it" face to face?
ref: 1968, Dear Doctor Hip Pocrates; advice your family doctor never gave you, page 5:
text: The great advantage of English public school life lies of course in the quality of tutelage it provides. Adrian had received a decent and broad English education in the area of his loins. […] He had quickly happened upon the truth which many lonely contemporaries would never discover, the truth that everybody, simply everybody, was panting for it and could, with patience, be shown that they were panting for it. So Adrian grabbed what was to hand and had the time of his life genitally – focusing exclusively on his own gender of course, for this was 1973 and girls had not yet been invented.
ref: 1991 September, Stephen Fry, chapter 1, in The Liar, London: Heinemann, →ISBN, section I, page 10:
glosses: The impersonal pronoun, used without referent, or with unstated but contextually implied referent, in various short idioms or expressions.
Referring to sexual intercourse or other sexual activity.
examples: text: 'Tisn't beauty, so to speak, nor good talk necessarily. It's just It. Some women'll stay in a man's memory if they once walked down a street
ref: 1904, Rudyard Kipling, Mrs Bathurst:
text: And she had It. It, hell; she had Those.
ref: 1927, Dorothy Parker, “Madame Glyn Lectures on 'It,' with Illustrations”, in The New Yorker, published 26 November 1927; republished in Brendan Gill, editor, The Portable Dorothy Parker, New York: Penguin, 1976, pages 464-468:
glosses: Sex appeal, especially that which goes beyond physical appearance.
examples: text: It is easy to see how she would think that.
text: "I know now!" said I. "I have seen this in your face a long while."
"No; have you really, my dear?" said he. "What a Dame Durden it is to read a face!"
ref: 1852 March – 1853 September, Charles Dickens, Bleak House, London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1853, →OCLC:
text: It was felt that I'd be the right man for the job.
text: I find it odd that you would say that.
text: It is hard seeing you so sick.
text: He saw to it that everyone would vote for him.
text: It is not clear if the report was true.
text: She made it clear what she expected by the weekend, which made it a problem to juggle her and other customers' jobs at the same time.
glosses: The impersonal pronoun, used as a placeholder for a delayed subject, or less commonly, object; known as the dummy pronoun (according to some definitions), anticipatory it or, more formally in linguistics, a syntactic expletive. The delayed subject is commonly a to-infinitive, a gerund, or a noun clause introduced by a subordinating conjunction.
examples: text: Are there more students in this class, or is this it?
text: That's it—I'm not going to any more candy stores with you.
glosses: All or the end; something after which there is no more.
examples: text: In briefe, I am content, and what should providence add more? Surely this is it [= it which] wee call Happinesse, and this doe I enjoy [...].
ref: 1643, Thomas Browne, Religio Medici, II.2:
glosses: Followed by an omitted and understood relative pronoun: That which; what.
Derived terms: aliensdidit
anticipatory it
any way one slices it
Bumpit
buy it
damnit
do it
dummy it
evolutiondidit
flooddidit
for it
FSMdidit
go at it
goddidit
goshdangit
goshdarnit
itness
keep it real
know-it-all
move it
preparatory it
Satandidit
stick-at-itiveness
that's it
tiswas
watch it
whatchacallit
Related terms: sense: other subject and object pronouns in English
word: he
sense: other subject and object pronouns in English
word: her
sense: other subject and object pronouns in English
word: him
sense: other subject and object pronouns in English
word: I
sense: other subject and object pronouns in English
word: me
sense: other subject and object pronouns in English
word: she
sense: other subject and object pronouns in English
word: thee
sense: other subject and object pronouns in English
word: them
sense: other subject and object pronouns in English
word: they
sense: other subject and object pronouns in English
word: thou
sense: other subject and object pronouns in English
word: us
sense: other subject and object pronouns in English
word: we
sense: other subject and object pronouns in English
word: ye
sense: other subject and object pronouns in English
word: you