What is a Pronoun?
Pronouns are one of the 9 parts of speech in English grammar. A pronoun is a word that takes the place of a noun. Pronouns are important in English. They are some of the first words we learn: I, you, he, she, it. There are different kinds of pronouns for different situations: subject pronouns, object pronouns, possessive pronouns, and reflexive pronouns. Instead of Sara, we can say she. Instead of those guys, we can say them. Instead of the sun, we can say it.
Why do we use pronouns?
One reason that we use pronouns is to avoid repetition. Think about this example:
Look at this beautiful table. The table is gorgeous. The table has a red top and the table's legs are steel. I really want to buy the table.
The table, the table, the table, the table—aaaaaaah. We try to avoid this kind of repetition in English. Instead of table, table, table, table, we usually say table once. After that first time, we use a pronoun, like it. This next example is more typical of how we speak in English:
Look at this beautiful table. It is gorgeous. It has a red top and its legs are steel. I really want to buy it.
Simpler and cleaner! That's why we use pronouns.
So a pronoun can take the place of a noun. But there are also some important differences between how we use nouns and pronouns. For instance, we don’t usually use a determiner before a pronoun: we say the table, but we never say the it. We say my friend, but we don’t say my him. We also don’t usually use adjectives before pronouns. We can say the red car, but it would be very strange to say the red it.
Now let's look at the five different kinds of personal pronouns:
English Personal Pronouns
In English, we use different pronouns to show grammatical person, gender, and singular/plural distinctions.
For example, if I am talking about myself, we call this the first person. If I are talking about myself alone, this is singular (only one person). Singular first person pronouns include I, me, mine, etc.
If I am talking about a group of people that includes me, this is the first person plural (more than one person). Plural first person pronouns include we, us, ours, etc.
English Pronoun Chart
Second person pronouns are used to talk about the person you are speaking to. These include you, yours, yourself, etc. You can be both singular and plural in English.
Third person pronouns are used to talk about people who are not either the speaker or the listener. They include the third person singular pronouns (like he, she, it) and third person singular pronouns (like they, them, etc.).
For inanimate objects—things that are not people—we use it, its, and itself.
They/Them Pronouns
When we use third person pronouns, we often distinguish between genders. For example, she, her, and hers are often used to talk about women, and he, him, and his are often used to talk about men. They, them, and their can be used as gender-neutral pronouns. We can use these either because we don't want or need to specify a gender, or because someone goes by non-gendered or nonbinary pronouns.
SUBJECT PRONOUNS
The first pronouns we teach are usually subject pronouns. The subject is often the noun right before the verb. Almost every sentence has a subject. Generally, the subject of the sentence is the person or thing that does the verb or makes the verb happen.
The tiger sleeps a lot.
In the example above, the verb is sleeps, and the subject is tiger. Who sleeps? The tiger does. The subject usually tells us who or what does the action. We have a special set of pronouns that we use to be the subject of a sentence. The table below lists the most common subject pronouns.
| Singular | Plural | |
|---|---|---|
| 1st person | I | we |
| 2nd person | you | you |
| 3rd person | she | they |
| he | ||
| it |
We don’t say Me like candy or Him has a cat. We say I like candy and He has a cat. Me and him are the wrong type of pronouns. We use subject pronouns. Here are some more examples:
I like movies.
Do you like movies?
Invite Clara. She likes movies.
He likes movies, too!
We like watching movies on weekends.
Before a verb, to express who or what does the action in a sentence, use a subject pronoun.
OBJECT PRONOUNS
Almost all verbs have a subject, and some also have an object. The object of a verb is the thing that receives an action. For example, you wouldn't just say, I want, right? You need to want something. We say I want coffee or I want a cheeseburger. Coffee and cheeseburger are objects. They receive the verb, want.
I want a hamburger.
I want a job.
I want a girlfriend.
Hamburger, job, and girlfriend are objects. Notice that objects generally come after the verb in the sentence. We use object pronouns to represent objects in sentences. This table lists the most common object pronouns:
| Singular | Plural | |
|---|---|---|
| 1st person | me | us |
| 2nd person | you | you |
| 3rd person | her | they |
| him | ||
| it |
Here are some examples of sentences using object pronouns:
That hamburger looks delicious. I want it.
Who is that girl? I think I know her.
You can have these books if you want them.
Can I help you?
My teacher hates me!
In all the examples above, the pronouns are the objects of a verb. We use the same set of object pronouns as the objects of prepositions, as you can see in these examples:
My grandmother gave that to me.
I've been getting weird texts from her.
We've heard so much about you!
After a verb or a preposition, you generally want to use an object pronoun.
POSSESSIVE PRONOUNS
To possess something is to own or have that thing. If I have a car, we can say that car is my possession. We can say, That car is mine. Mine is a pronoun in this sentence. It represents the car, the thing that I possess. Mine is a possessive pronoun. Here is a chart with the most common possessive pronouns:
| Singular | Plural | |
|---|---|---|
| 1st person | mine | ours |
| 2nd person | yours | yours |
| 3rd person | hers | theirs |
| his | ||
| its |
Here are some example sentences with possessive pronouns:
That car is hers.
This is my drink. That one is yours.
All the coats are in a big messy pile. I can't find mine!
As you can see, possessive pronouns can be used to talk about things that belong to specific people.
POSSESSIVE DETERMINERS
Possessive determiners (also called possessive adjectives) are not actually pronouns, but it's a good idea to learn them at the same time, because they are very similar to possessive pronouns. The difference is that possessive determiners can not replace nouns; they come before nouns to tell us whose they are. If someone asks, Whose iPad is this? you could answer with a possessive pronoun: It's mine. But you could also use a possessive determiner:
That's my iPad.
With a possessive determiner, it is important to include a noun after. Just saying That is my. would by wrong. Here is a list of the most common possessive determiners.
| Singular | Plural | |
|---|---|---|
| 1st person | my | our |
| 2nd person | your | your |
| 3rd person | her | their |
| his | ||
| its |
And here are some examples of possessive determiners in sentences:
Sorry, I have to take this call. It's my son.
Cheryl is at her English class.
We lost our baseball game.
Please take off your shoes.
Can you believe they lost their homework again?
REFLEXIVE PRONOUNS
So we have talked about subjects and objects, right? Subjects are the people or things that do the action in the verb, and objects are the people or things that receive the action. Sometimes, those are the same person, right? For example, if I cut my finger, I hurt someone. The someone I hurt is me (ouch!). But in English we don't say I hurt me. We have special pronouns for the object in this situation, and they are called reflexive pronouns.
Here is a table of the most common reflexive pronouns in English:
| Singular | Plural | |
|---|---|---|
| 1st person | myself | ourselves |
| 2nd person | yourself | yourselves |
| 3rd person | herself | themselves |
| himself | ||
| itself |
And here are some examples of reflexive pronouns used in sentences:
Clara taught herself English.
Don't play with that knife. You will hurt yourself.
The kids are entertaining themselves in the yeard.
Oh, nothing. I'm just talking to myself.
After a couple of days, the problem fixed itself.
Complete English Pronoun Chart
Here is a complete table of all the pronouns discussed in this post. There are still some other types of pronouns, however. Demonstrative pronouns and relative pronouns, for example, are usually studied separately.
| Subject | Object | Possessive Pronoun |
Possessive Determiner |
Reflexive | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Singular | 1st Person | I | me | mine | my | myself | |
| 2nd person | you | you | yours | your | yourself | ||
| 3rd person | Feminine | she | her | hers | her | herself | |
| Masculine | he | him | his | his | himself | ||
| Neutral | they | them | theirs | their | themself | ||
| Inanimate | it | it | its | its | itself | ||
| Plural | 1st Person | we | us | ours | our | ourselves | |
| 2nd Person | you | you | yours | your | yourselves | ||
| 3rd Person | they | them | theirs | their | themselves | ||
| Impersonal | one | one | one's | one's | oneself | ||
Pronombres en Inglés
Pronomes pessoais em inglês
الضمائر في الانجليزية
Parts of Speech in English
Every word in a language can be categorized by its part of speech. Parts of speech (also known as word classes) tell us what a word does, along with how it functions and makes meaning. We can also group parts of speech into lexical words, which carry a lot of meaning, and function words (or grammar words), which help us make sentences and show the relationship between things.
Overview of English Parts of Speech
How Many Parts of Speech are There?
There are a total of 9 different parts of speech in English: nouns, pronouns, verbs, adverbs, adjectives, prepositions, conjunctions, interjections, and articles (or determiners). Read on for a brief explanation of each!
If an article tells you that there are only 8, they are often missing articles or determiners, which are a really important one, especially for language learners.
Why Learn about Parts of Speech?
If you’re looking for the parts of speech in English grammar, you’ve come to the right place! If you’re trying to learn English online by yourself, understanding the parts of speech is a good place to start. They can help you to understand the structure of the language to guide your studying. If you are looking for an in-depth guide to English grammar, our complete English grammar guide might be more helpful.
Frequency of Different Parts of Speech
At Ginseng English, we believe in taking a research-informed, strategic approach to learning English. So understanding the general frequency of the different parts of speech is helpful. Take a look at the following table showing the proportion of the different parts of speech in conversational English and academic prose. (Note that the percentages are approximate and may not total 100% because the original categorization was slightly different from ours. This is only to give a general sense of the proportions.
| Conversation | Academic | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Lexical | Nouns | 15% | 30% |
| Verbs | 12.5% | 10% | |
| Adjectives | 2.5% | 10% | |
| Adverbs | 5% | 3% | |
| Function | Pronouns | 16.5% | 4% |
| Prepositions | 5.5% | 15% | |
| Determiners | 4.5% | 10% | |
| Conjunctions | 4.5% | 5% |
Source: Biber, et. al., (1999). Longman Grammar of Spoken and Written English.
Nouns
Lots of teachers say a noun is a person, place, or thing! You should also add ideas to that list. Proper nouns in English start with a capital letter, but other nouns do not.
Here are some examples of nouns:
This is my father.
We are from Ecuador.
I have two dogs.
On this holiday we celebrate our independence.
Nouns in English can be singular or plural. to form a regular plural, we simply add -s or -es to the end of a noun. Irregular plurals do not follow this rule.
Here is a complete article on Nouns in English.
Pronouns
Pronouns are used to stand in place for a noun, because in English we don’t like to repeat nouns again and again. The noun that a pronoun refers back to is called its antecedent. Examples of common pronouns in English are he, she, it, him, her, mine, this, that, myself. Pronouns in English change form to show, for example, whether they are singular or plural, subjects or objects, male or female or neither.
Here are examples of some basic pronouns:
Can I have that?
We are with her.
I think I need something to eat.
Here is a complete article on pronouns in English.
Verbs
Verbs are words we use to talk about actions, states, and occurrences (things that happen). Many people would say that nouns and verbs are the most important and useful parts of speech in any language.
The main verb in a sentence has a subject, generally a noun or pronoun referring to the person or thing that the sentence is about. For example, in the sentence Maria walks, the verb is walks and the subject is Maria. Verbs can change form to ‘agree with’ their subject.
Here are some examples of verbs:
They cook every night
We went to the store.
This will help the people.
Notice in that last example that a verb can be more than one word. This is called a compound verb. There are two types of verb: main verbs and helping verbs (also called auxiliary verbs).
Adjectives
Adjectives are words that describe, or modify, nouns. They generally (but not always) come before nouns. In the following phrases, the adjectives are in bold:
a big party some terrible news the best pizza an interesting idea a really strong leader
For more information, check out our list of the most common adjectives in English.
Adverbs
Like adjectives, adverbs are describing words. But while adjectives describe only nouns, adverbs can describe verbs, adjectives, other adverbs, or entire sentences.
Because adverbs are so versatile, it is hard to say much that applies to all adverbs generally. They can appear at different places in the sentence: at the beginning, before a verb, before an adjective, after a verb, or at the end of a sentence.
walk slowly speak clearly immediately fell run fast
Many adverbs end in -ly, and many adjectives can be transformed into adverbs by adding the suffix -ly: slow becomes slowly, eventual becomes eventually, stupid becomes stupidly, etc.
One of the most basic types of adverbs are adverbs of frequency. Click through to read more about those.
Articles
The articles in English are a, an (indefinite articles) and the (definite article). Articles can be really tricky, but the basic idea is that we use indefinite articles when we are introducing a new noun to our listeners or not referring to a specific object. On the other hand, we use definite articles to refer to a specific object that our listeners already know about.
Note: You may find articles out there claiming that articles are a type of adjective. This is simply incorrect. At one time (about 300 years ago) some people thought this, but this is not a current view.
Note: Some grammars treat articles as a subcategory of determiners. This is a valid view. Determiners include possessive determiners such as my and your, as well as demonstrative determiners such as this, that, these, and those.
Prepositions
Prepositions are, to put it simply, words that are placed before (pre-position) nouns or pronouns to connect them to other parts of speech in a sentence. There are different types of preposition that give different types of information: prepositions of time, prepositions of place, prepositions of direction.
Conjunctions
Conjunctions are words that connect. They can connect, for example, a list of nouns in a series. But most of the time, when we are talking about conjunctions, we are talking about connecting one clause to another clause in the same sentence. There are two types of conjunctions: coordinating conjunctions and subordinating conjunctions.
Coordinating Conjunctions
Coordinating conjunctions connect two clauses of equal importance into what we call a compound sentence. There are not many coordinating conjunctions. You can remember them with the acronym FANBOYS: for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so.
Subordinating Conjunctions
When we connect clauses using subordinating conjunctions, we are giving one clause more importance than the other. The less important clause is called a subordinate clause. Two or more clauses combined with subordinating conjunctions are called a complex sentence. Some common subordinating conjunctions are because, although, before, since, when, while, and if.
Interjections
Interjections are funny words: ouch, wow, hmm, oops, well, geez.. They are sort of the black sheep of English grammar. They are not connected to the other words in a sentence (they are inter-jected, put in between, the other words). Generally they add emotion to a sentence. Here are some examples of interjections:
Wow, I'm so tired.
Ouch! I cut my finger.
Oh, you moved to Manhattan
For and since are two English prepositions that we can use to talk about time in English. They are similar, but we use them a little differently (Be careful! For and since have other meanings as well).
Which verb tenses do we use with for and since
We can use these words with many different verb tenses, especially these ones:
Many learners try to use for and since with the simple present, but this is usually an error:
I am living in Medellin since 2011
I study English for 3 hours
There are some exceptions, but generally you want to use the present perfect or present perfect continuous in to describe an action or situation that started in the past and is still true:
I have lived in Medellin since 2011
I have been studying English for 3 hours
The Difference Between For and Since
Here is the important difference between for and since: We use for with an amount of time, but we use since with a point in time.
Using For
We use for to express an amount of time (we could also call this a period or time or a duration). Here are some examples of for with amounts of time:
for two years
for 3 hours
for a week
for a long time
for a little while
for centuries
for ages
for as long as I can remember
Using Since
We use since with a point in time, the time when an action or situation began.
since last week
since Monday
since December 11
since September
since 1984
since Thanksgiving
since last fall
since I was born
Ago
Ago is a useful word for changing most durations into points in time. That is, two years is a duration and we use it with for. But if we add ago, two years ago is a point in time, and we can say since two years ago. Here are some examples with ago:
since five years ago
since 3 hours ago
since a week ago
Note that using since with ago is a little informal, and better for speaking than formal writing.
The present perfect continuous is an important verb form for talking about recent events and their durations. Read about the rules for using the present perfect continuous tense, how we form it, and tons of example sentences!
We have to make decisions every day, but sometimes it’s so hard to just make up your mind! If you’re on the fence about a big decision, then these idioms might help your thought process! (Or at least help you procrastinate making a difficult decision😂)
2018 is drawing to a close, so it's the perfect opportunity to review the year's best blog post to help you learn English for free!
When considering where to study English in the US, the first places that come to most international student’s minds are New York City, Boston, Los Angeles, and maybe Chicago, but there is so much more to America! Take a look at these brief descriptions of weird and wacky American cities and see if any of them might be your cup of tea.
The future continuous (also called the future progressive) is an English verb form used to describe actions that will be in progress at a particular moment in the future. This can be a time or date, or it can be another action.
This is not a common verb form. Less than .1% of English verbs are in the future continuous.
Keep reading to learn the rules and reasons for using and forming the future continuous, including loads of charts and examples!
It is important to realize that continuous and progressive are different names for the same thing. In some places, progressive is more common, but continuous is a more common term overall.
USing the Future continuous
When we see a continuous verb, it tells us that something is in progress at a particular time. With the future continuous, that time is in the future. This can be a time or date (next weekend, tomorrow at 5, on November 3rd) or it can be another action in the future.
Chart for Future Continuous Tense In English
Here are some example sentences:
Don’t call her at 8. She will be flying to Denver then.
I will probably be running when you come home.
Try to be quiet when you come home tonight. Everyone will be sleeping.
In these examples, the continuous action (will be flying, will be running) will start before the other specific action (come home) or time (at 8), and continued after that action or time.
We can also use the future continuous to show that a future action will continue over a period of time.
I’m going to be studying all next week.
We will be traveling for most of 2019.
Forming the Future continuous
There are two options for forming the future continuous: will or going to.
Formula With Will
To form the future continuous with will, use will be and the continuous form of the verb, with -ing.
subject + will be + VERBing
Conjugation with Will
Here is a complete conjugation table:
| Singular | Plural | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1st person | I | will be working. | we | will be working. |
| 2nd person | you | will be working. | you | will be working. |
| 3rd person | he | will be working. | they | will be working. |
| she | will be working. | |||
| it | will be working. | |||
Formula With Going To
To form the future continuous with going to, you need to use the correct present form of the verb to be (am/is/are). Then use going to be. Then use the -ing form of the verb.
subject + am/is/are + going to be + VERBing
Conjugation with Going to
Here is the going to conjugation table:
| Singular | Plural | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1st person | I | am going to be working. | we | are going to be working. |
| 2nd person | you | are going to be working. | you | are going to be working. |
| 3rd person | he | is going to be working. | they | are going to be working. |
| she | is going to be working. | |||
| it | is going to be working. | |||
Other Forms
Questions
In the future continuous, you have more than one helping verb. To make a question, move the subject after the first helping verb (be or will).
Will you be eating out tonight?
When will you be arriving in Philadelphia?
Are you going to be sleeping when I get home?
What are you going to be reading next semester?
Negative Sentences
To form a negative, insert not after the first helping verb (be or will).
I will not be eating out tonight.
She will not be running.
We are not going to be reading Nabokov.
I am not going to be sleeping when you get home.
The Passive Voice
Making a passive sentence in the future progressive is extremely complex and extremely rare. In the conventional passive, putting be in the future progressive results in the unnatural combination of be and being: …will be being… or …going to be being…
For this reason, we recommend using the get passive in the future progressive. Put get in the future progressive (is going to be getting, are going to be getting, will be getting) and then the perfect form of the main verb.
We are going to be getting picked up by my mom.
If we miss another payment, we’ll be getting kicked out!
CHECK OUT THESE OTHER FREE GRAMMAR RESOURCES:
This post teaches basic English vocabulary for describing our closest family members. Lots of examples and images!
We have to make decisions every day, but sometimes it’s so hard to just make up your mind! If you’re on the fence about a big decision, then these idioms might help your thought process! (Or at least help you procrastinate making a difficult decision😂)
They say some friendly competition never hurt anyone. In fact, sometimes, people even thrive on a little competition! If you’re one of these people, these idioms about competition might come in handy…
Today we bring you a variety of English idioms featuring black and white images to help you visualize the meanings, along with sample sentences and definitions!
The simple present tense and present continuous tense can be difficult for English learners. This article explains the differences in how we form and use these two tenses.
The time has come for Americans to kiss summer goodbye and welcome fall (also known as autumn). Here are some idioms about the fall season!
What are Adverbs of Frequency?
Adverbs are an important part of speech in English. Just like adjectives describe nouns, adverbs are words that describe verbs. There are of course many different ways we can describe a verb. We can talk about how something happens, why it happens, when it happens. Adverbs of frequency tell us how often—or how frequently—an action happens.
The Most Common Adverbs of Frequency
Some of the most common adverbs of frequency are shown in the image. It is very common for teachers and textbooks to show adverbs of frequency with percentages next to them to explain their meaning; for example: 80% of the time = usually. Be careful. It is important to note that these can only be very rough estimates. It is more useful and accurate to say that usually is more than sometimes but less than always. The exceptions are always, which means 100% of the time, and never, which means 0% of the time.
Rules for using adverbs of frequency
Adverbs of frequency often describe habits, routines, and repeated actions, so they are frequently used with the simple present tense.
It is sometimes difficult to know where to put adverbs of frequency in a sentence. When describing a simple verb tense, with no auxiliary verbs, adverbs of frequency generally come between the subject and the verb. Look at these examples:
We never travel in the fall.
Lydia generally takes the train to work.
They sometimes have wine with dinner.
The exception to this rule is when the main verb in the sentence is to be. If the sentence is a subject + BE + noun or subject + BE + adjective sentence, put the adverb of frequency after be.
Munir is always late.
This is never a good sign.
We are usually the first ones in line.
The adverbs often, sometimes, generally, frequently, usually, and typically can go at the beginning of a sentence, as you can see here:
Generally Lydia takes the train to work.
Sometimes they have wine with dinner.
Usually we are the first ones in line.
Note that no comma is necessary when an adverb of frequency starts a sentence.
It is also possible to put these same adverbs at the end of a sentence, though this is more common in spoken English than in writing:
Lydia takes the train to work generally
They have wine with dinner sometimes
We are the first ones in line usually
Chart Showing Common Adverbs of Frequency