pronounuse

Pronoun use, sometimes written as pronoun use or pronoun usage, refers to how speakers and writers select and integrate pronouns to refer to entities in discourse. It covers how pronouns agree with their antecedents in person, number, and case, and how they function within sentences and larger text. Pronoun use spans many languages and includes personal pronouns (I, you, he, she, it, we, they) and their object forms, possessive forms, reflexives, and pronouns used in questions, relatives, and demonstratives.

Core pronoun categories include personal pronouns, possessive determiners (my, your, his), possessive pronouns (mine, yours), reflexive pronouns (myself, themselves), demonstratives (this, that), relative pronouns (who, which, that), and interrogatives (who, what). In many languages, pronouns carry information about gender, number, and formality, while other languages encode less grammatical information in pronouns. Pronoun use also involves pronoun-antecedent agreement and the management of pronoun reference across clauses and discourse.

Contemporary practice in many communities emphasizes respect for individuals’ pronoun preferences. Nonbinary and gender-diverse pronouns, such as they/them, are increasingly used, and many style guides recognize singular they as acceptable in reference to a person when gender is unknown or nonbinary. Pronoun use intersects with sociolinguistics, identity, and etiquette, and is subject to ongoing discussion about prescriptive rules versus descriptive, evolving language norms.

Cross-linguistically, pronoun systems vary widely. Some languages have gendered or formal pronouns, others rely on pronoun dropping or different agreement patterns. In education, workplaces, and media, policies and guidelines around pronoun use aim to promote clarity, respect, and inclusivity.