Do you know what possessive pronouns are? This article will provide you with all of the information you need on possessive pronouns, including the definition, usage, example sentences, and more!
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Kevin
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November 24, 2021
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Common Questions
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What is a personal possessive pronoun?
According to Grammarly, personal possessive pronouns show that something belongs to someone. The list of personal pronouns show ownership and are my, our, your, his, her, its, their, mine, ours, yours, his, hers, its, and theirs in English grammar. These are never spelled with apostrophes, which is a common mistake. Independent possessive pronouns and absolute possessive pronouns must be used without a noun, not to be confused with possessive adjectives or object pronouns. There are many different types of pronoun like a subject pronoun and personal pronoun. These possessive forms show a noun’s possession as well as singular or plural form and gender like male and female. Possessive pronouns take the place of a noun of a specific person or thing.
Many different languages also contain words that mean possessive pronouns. You may notice that some of these translations of possessive pronouns look and sound similar to one another. These are called cognates, which are words and phrases in different languages that likely have the same root or language of origin, causing them to sound the same. The below list of translations of possessive pronouns is provided by Word Sense.
- Nogai: тартым авыс
- Dutch: bezittelijk voornaamwoord (neut.)
- Russian: притяжа́тельное местоиме́ние (neut.)
- German: besitzanzeigendes Fürwort (neut.); Possessivpronomen (neut.), Possessivum (neut.), Possessiv (neut.)
- Faroese: ognarfornavn (neut.)
- Finnish: possessiivipronomini
- Korean: 소유대명사 (soyu-daemyeongsa)
- Slovene: svojilni zaimek (masc.)
- Macedonian: посвојна заменка
- Catalan: pronom possessiu (masc.)
- Lithuanian: savybinis įvardis (masc.)
- Portuguese: pronome possessivo (masc.)
- Greek: κτητική αντωνυμία (fem.)
- Polish: zaimek dzierżawczy (m-in)
- Hungarian: birtokos névmás
- Ancient Greek: κτητική ἀντωνυμία (fem.)
- Italian: pronome possessivo (masc.)
- Spanish: pronombre posesivo (masc.)
- Japanese: 所有代名詞 (しょゆうだいめいし, shoyū daimeishi)
- Novial: posesivi pronomine
- French: pronom possessif (masc.)
- Icelandic: eignarfornafn (neut.), efn. (neut.)
- Mandarin: 所有格代名詞, 所有格代名词 (suǒyǒugé dàimíngcí), 物主代詞, 物主代词 (wùzhǔ dàicí)
- Esperanto: posesiva pronomo, poseda pronomo, posesivo
- Irish: forainm sealbhach
- Swedish: possessivt pronomen (neut.)
- Romanian: pronume posesiv (neut.)
- Scottish Gaelic: riochdair seilbheach (masc.)
- Latin: pronomen possessivum (neut.)
- Danish: possessivt pronomen (neut.), possesivpronomen (neut.), ejestedord (neut.)
What are examples of possessive pronouns?
A possessive pronoun can be used in many different contexts in the English language. Trying to use a word or literary technique in a sentence is one of the best ways to memorize what it is, but you can also try making flashcards or quizzes that test your knowledge. Try using this term of the day in a sentence today! The following sentences are examples of possessive pronouns from Your Dictionary that can help get you started incorporating this tool into your everyday use. These can come at the end of a sentence. Try to use the term possessive pronouns today or notice when someone else is using a possessive pronoun.
- The bag is theirs.
- The neighbour next door, Sarah, knew the power outage was her own fault as she did not read the instructions.
- I appreciate your understanding of the matter.
- I feel bad at his missing this opportunity.
- Her coming to us was the right thing to do.
- The dog is mine.
- We shall finally have what is rightfully ours.
- Their mother gets along well with yours.
- Alice and her New York lawyers sued the company.
- The house is theirs and its paint is flaking.
- I loved listening to his singing.
- The kids are yours and mine.
- Jane’s name was given to her by her own grandmother.
- Their singing inspired us.
- What’s mine is yours, my friend.
- The children make their beds without my asking them to.
- The money was really theirs for the taking.
- I so appreciated his helping out.
- Nobody knew that Michael was going to his court date tomorrow.
- Daisy baked cookies for his own graduation.
- Your taking the prize was a nice surprise.
- Their mocking of him was inappropriate.
- The ring is hers.
- The cat is yours.
What are other literary techniques and devices?
There are many different literary and grammatical techniques and devices that you might see when you are reading prose or poetry. It is important to recognize these terms because they are always used for some purpose. Knowing these devices can help readers understand the author’s deeper meaning and why they are using such a device. Take a look at the below list of grammatical devices from OED and see how many you know! Then try researching ones that are unfamiliar to you.
- dual
- case
- intransitive
- determiner
- second person
- part of speech
- simple
- possessive
- to-infinitive
- subjective
- relative
- past tense
- prefix
- past participle
- declarative
- indirect speech
- quasi-
- accusative
- nominal relative | nominal relative clause
- combination
- conditional
- predicative
- masculine
- objective
- premodify | premodifier
- head
- combining form (comb. form)
- infinitive
- article
- construction
- absolute (absol.)
- conjunction (conj.)
- complementary
- parenthetical | parenthetically
- interrogative
- reflexive
- abstract
- suffix
- comparative
- gender
- genitive
- possessive adjective
- possessive pronouns | proper name
- mass noun
- instrumental
- non-finite
- modify | modifier
- complement
- common noun
- plural
- interjection
- base form
- compound | compounding
- positive
- periphrasis | periphrastic
- object | direct object | indirect object
- copular verb | copula
- indicative
- adjective
- passive infinitive
- concrete
- postmodify | postmodifier
- possessive pronoun
- protasis
- feminine
- parasynthetic
- person
- tense
- causative
- superlative
- anaphoric
- neuter
- adverbial | adverbially
- agree | agreement
- pronoun (pron.)
- mood
- number
- agent noun
- main verb
- count noun
- direct object
- inflection | inflected | inflectional
- locative
- antecedent
- personal pronoun
- cataphoric
- active
- present participle
- vocative
- verb (v.)
- stem
- unmarked genitive
- bare infinitive
- that-clause
- zero
- attributive
- apodosis and protasis
- indefinite
- prepositional phrase
- present tense
- subject
- progressive
- direct question
- phrase (phr.)
- special use
- prepositional object
- sentence adverb |sentence adverbial
- third-person
- auxiliary verb | auxiliary
- morpheme
- element
- finite
- dative
- filler
- clause
- appositive
- apposition
- similative
- nominative
- collective noun
- anticipatory
- intensifier
- cognate object
- collocation | collocate
- modal verb | modal auxiliary verb | modal auxiliary
- pleonasm | pleonastic
- demonstrative
- perfect
- indirect object
- phrasal verb
- construed (const., constr.)
- pro-form
- verbal noun
- ellipsis | elliptical
- participial adjective
- first person
- participle | past participle | present participle
- main clause
- noun (n.)
- passive
- non-referential
- double object
- definite article
- indirect passive
- singular
- imperative (imper.)
- indirect question
- subordinate clause
- subjunctive
- direct speech
- preposition (prep.)
- optative
- noun phrase
- transitive
- prepositional passive
- adverb (adv.)
- impersonal (impers.)
Overall, the possessive case shows ownership.
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