Talk:Personal pronoun

message: I have seen countries and states referred to as "it," but am told the correct way to refer to them (in legal writing) is with a feminine pronoun (she, her).  I cannot find a citation for this rule, and I cannot see that this is done uniformly.  Anyone have any ideas?--Hhoblit (talk) 16:55, 7 July 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Feminine personal pronoun for countries, states, etc. 

message: This page is written from the point of view of an English speaker. The pronoun phenomena is much too diverse to be based on English (which actually has a very simple personal pronoun system).  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.249.108.58 (talk) 08:20, 25 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  This page is way too English-centric

message: Biggest part about the english personal pronoun on this page is already coverded (and better) in the main page "English personal pronoun". I suggest deleting it here. Parts that aren't in this main page could be moved there. Ikwilhetweten (talk) 11:53, 31 July 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  English part already covered 

message: I believe the third-person singular neuter archaic possessives (pronoun and adjective) are "his."--Dustin Asby 17:25, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: You are correct, but to be honest, I don't think the table should be giving all these archaic and non-standard forms anyway. It's one thing to add footnotes with links to relevant articles; actually including such forms in the table seems like bloat. Ruakh 21:11, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

text: We could split the table and have a mini-table for archaics only? And maybe a separate one for informals? Dunno. PizzaMargherita 09:37, 8 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Its" used to be "his." 

message: Can we cut the archaic and non-standard pronouns from the main table? I think it's just bloat. There are some major archaic and non-standard pronouns that deserve note (thou and its kin; y'all and its kin), but these can easily be moved to a footnote that mentions them briefly and links to You. (To my surprise and delight, You already covers all the notable archaic and non-standard forms, while giving much more information about them than this article currently does.)
(This comment was inspired by PizzaMargherita's last edit summary, with which I agree.)
Ruakh 15:43, 25 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Can we cut the non-standard pronouns? 

message: Latin does have third-person personal pronouns (is, ea, id) as well as demonstrative pronouns including the forms of ille from which most Romance language third-person personal pronouns derive.Kineticman 10:45, 18 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Third person pronouns in Latin 

message: See also the discussions at Talk:Pronoun. FilipeS 14:17, 29 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Other discussions

message: Does anyone have access to a reliable reference on pronoun systems?  I remember back in various linguistic classes that the most stable (and common) pronoun system will consist of either 6 or 11 pronouns.  
6 [ 1s, 1p, 2s, 2p, 3s, 3p ]
11 [ 1s, 1di, 1de, 1pi, 1pe, 2s, 2d, 2p, 3s, 3d, 3p]
(singular, dual, plural, inclusive, exclusive)
And that English falls as being in the very rare position of only 5 (1s, 1p, 2, 3s, 3p) and I recall several authors postulating that it is this unstable position that is pushing for people to recreate the distinction between 2s and 2p with various forms (you all/y'all, yous, &c.).
I'd try to find some books, but am pressed for time for the time being, to head to the University to start sifting through the linguistics collections.
68.144.64.164 22:26, 5 June 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I take it that by "pronoun" you mean "personal pronoun", and that you consider pronouns that differ only in gender, case, or emphasis to be different forms of the same pronoun? —RuakhTALK 15:43, 6 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pronoun systems 

message: At the upper right of the page is a short examples section with the personal pronouns in bold. His and your also appear in the examples but are not bold. I don't pretend to know if these are really personal pronouns or not but i thought they were. Shouldn't they be in bold also? If they are personal pronouns and there is a reason for not bolding them maybe they could be replaced with other words as it adds confusion. zorkerz (talk) 02:08, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  His and Your in the Examples Section 

message: Isn't "one" also a personal pronoun? If it is, I find its absence from the article amusing because it is used frequently as a personal pronoun *in* the article.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.20.213.37 (talk) 23:11, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  One 

message: "In English, it is standard to use personal pronouns explicitly even when the context already understood, or could easily be understood by reading the sentences that follow."
I've read the sentence quoted above several times; as far as I can tell it doesn't say anything meaningful. It certainly is grammatically incorrect, but the problem is deeper than that. Can someone who understands what the author was trying to say please rewrite it. Are they talking about when personal pronouns ARE used, or when they AREN'T used ("explicitly" sounds like using the original noun)? Are they talking about a situation where the context IS understood (so pronoun would work), or where it IS NOT understood?ToolmakerSteve (talk) 12:10, 5 July 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: It means English is not a pro-drop language. - TAKASUGI Shinji (talk) 01:06, 6 July 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Usage" section: Unclear first sentence 

message: What is the current guidelines when referring to animals. Should they have a personal pronoun in formal writing? I know PETA asked journalists to change their guidelines in favour of personal pronouns, but what is the standard "style guideline" in modern English usage? Jack (talk) 18:25, 4 December 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Usage for animals 

message: User:Frehley has proposed to merge Grammatical person and Personal pronoun.
*Oppose. Having separate pages for grammatical categories and for parts of speech is a good idea. We could as well merge Grammatical person with Verb, or Grammatical case with Personal pronoun. --ἀνυπόδητος (talk) 13:20, 20 September 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Merge discussion 

message: The opening definition -- "Personal pronouns are pronouns used as substitutes for proper or common nouns" -- does not seem adequate since the same could be said of, for example, "these" in "I'll take these", and yet "these" is (according to pronoun at least) not a personal pronoun. 86.134.72.86 (talk) 21:08, 9 November 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Definition 

message: "Slavic languages have two different third-person genitive pronouns (one reflexive, one not)."
If I remember correctly, Slavic languages use the two different forms that are mentioned in the above sentence not only for the third person but across all the persons. At least this holds for Russian. Can anyone confirm that this holds for Serbian and other Slavic languages, too? --RokasT (talk) 23:10, 27 November 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, the reflexive pronoun is used for all persons. But how this does make the examples wrong? CapnPrep (talk) 23:28, 27 November 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wrong Slavic Examples 

message: Could anyone find a good refrence to the personal pronoun order?  It seems in all language study to be standardised to I, you-masculine & you-feminine / you, he, she, we, you plural (possibly with masculine before feminine plural), they.
Is there a root to this convention?178.208.204.125 (talk) 20:04, 20 April 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Order 

message: I've been speaking, reading, and writing Japanese for thirty years, and do not know what gender-neutral third-person pronoun is referred to in this article. For the most part, Japanese do not use third person pronouns in normal conversation. The third person is called by name or referred to as "that person" ("ano kata," あの方). This is why it's possible to talk about a third person at length without once giving a concrete hint as to the person's gender. Could it be this "ano kata" that is referred to here? Because that sounds like a stretch to me. Matt Thorn (talk) 08:27, 14 May 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: Japanese does not have a "closed" pronoun system, the way Indo-European and Semitic languages do, and there are many forms in the language which can be used pronominally, and of course pronouns are often completely omitted.  I think most or all words used as third person pronouns in Japanese are gender-nonspecific except kare and kanojo... AnonMoos (talk) 07:18, 22 March 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Japanese gender-neutral third-person pronoun? 

message: Personal pronouns can be whatever one desires. It shouldn't be contained to a few paragraphs that are set in stone like on Wikipedia. It's 2020 ffs  -- Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.81.110.215 (talk) 18:10, 9 February 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: It's mostly about technical linguistics and grammar... AnonMoos (talk) 07:18, 22 March 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  This article should be more Political Correct? 

message: I am no grammarian and came to this article looking for a gender pronoun explanation. My comment is that by using the contraction 'it's' in the initial example, a common confusion is being introduced on top of a confusing explanation! Why not just use 'It is a good idea. (pronoun and pro-form)' and 'It is raining. (pronoun but not pro-form)'? Thanks!  -- Preceding unsigned comment added by Captkirksc (talk  o  contribs) 16:11, 23 January 2022 (UTC)
replies: text: The uncontracted forms could be considered stilted or formal in many contexts.  I'm not sure using contractions creates any real confusion... AnonMoos (talk) 07:21, 22 March 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Introducing confusion in the introduction! 

message: An edit on the 4th of February 2023 modified the first paragraph under 'gender', appending the text 'or to a person who does not identify as either a man or a woman' to the end of the sentence discussing use of 'singular they' (along with making a couple of other minor changes). I wish to express criticism of the appropriateness of this change, but please do not misunderstand this as a disagreement with, or an attack upon, the 'gender-neutral movement' itself. That is not where I'm coming from.
The first paragraph includes a description of the long-standing and universally accepted fundamental rules of English grammar relating to gender (in summary from the text - 'he' for a man, 'she' for a woman' and 'singular they' for unknown/unspecified, along with a description of the use of 'it'). Notably there is an entire second paragraph following this one dedicated to discussing certain issues, including a specific mention of the contemporary 'gender neutral language movement'.
The addition to the description of fundamental rules made in the referenced edit, which is clearly connected to the contemporary movements pushing for greater use of gender neutral language and greater trans rights, is neither a long standing part of the grammatical rule set, nor a universally accepted one, yet the edit makes it look like it's both. I take issue with this from the point of view of factual correctness. People read these articles for many reasons and we should strive to avoid misinforming them. When I read this paragraph, this addition stood out to me as something that just did not belong there.
I have no issue with there being a mention or discussion, somewhere within this article, of gender neutral language or use of 'they' with respect to non-binary individuals, however it need to be done in the right way and the right place, avoiding misinforming readers as to what the grammar rules have long been and how universally accepted rules are. That first paragraph is just not the right place for it; The second is, and there's already a related bit of text there (which perhaps could be tweaked to more explicitly mention non-binary individuals).
I feel that this problematic edit needs to be reverted. In fact I did revert it, but then it was restored right back with a comment to "check the talk page regarding this change, thank you", yet no comment was left here for me to read...
It is worth noting that other related pages, such as `English_personal_pronouns`, do a somewhat better job of discussing this. 80.43.62.240 (talk) 08:58, 2 October 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  'or to a person who does not identify as either a man or a woman'