Pronoun Agreement

Pronoun Agreement—a pronoun must agree with its antecedent in gender (male/female/neuter) and number (singular/plural).

INDEFINITE PRONOUNS

(Always Singular)

Anyone Someone Everyone No one Each

Anything Something Everything Nothing Either

Anybody Somebody Everybody Nobody Neither

Pronoun Reference—it must be clear to what word a pronoun refers—every pronoun must have a clear antecedent.

SUBJECT Pronouns OBJECT Pronouns

I Me

She Her

He Him

We Us

They Them

Who Whom

Whoever Whomever

Note: “It” and “You” belong to both groups

USE SUBJECT PRONOUNS in the following cases:

ü In compound subjects (“Ted and I (rather than me) are going to attend.”)

ü Before and AFTER the forms of the verb TO BE (am, is, are, was, were, has been, have been).

ü After the words than and as

USE OBJECT PRONOUNS in the following cases:

ü As objects of verbs

ü After prepositions (object of the preposition)

(I gave the book to Ted and him (rather than he)

This is between you and me (me rather than I because between is a preposition and you and me are its objects)

Commonly Used Prepositions (once again)

about	at	by	like	through
above	before	during	near	throughout
across	behind	except	of	to
after	below	for	off	toward
against	beneath	from	on	under
among	beside	in	onto	until
around	between	inside	over	with
as	beyond	into	since	without

Practice Timeê Create a few prepositional phrases using pronouns as the objects. In each case, be sure to choose from the object pronoun list. Remember that occasionally the correct pronoun will sound wrong because we’ve heard it said wrong so much.

Examples: This is for Dan, Bob, and her.

This secret is between you and me.