Me, Myself, and I: Reflexive Pronouns
I love having my friends share their language pet peeves with me. The struggle with pronouns is a big one. Thanks for this one, Evelyn.
We touched on figuring out how to use certain pronouns when we talked about hypercorrectness. When there are multiple pronouns at the end of a sentence, the tip is to take out the others to determine which pronoun you need. You wouldn’t say, “She gave it to he and I” because you wouldn’t say, “She gave it to he” or “She gave it to I.”
Another tough area is reflexive pronouns. Pronouns ending in “-self” or “-selves” are called reflexive. There are nine of them: myself, yourself, himself, herself, itself, oneself, ourselves, yourselves, and themselves. As you can see, the singular pronouns end in “-self,” and the plural pronouns end in “-selves.”*
Use reflexive pronouns to communicate the following information:
Indicate that the object of the sentence is the same person or thing as the subject of the sentence. That is, the persons or things having something done to them are the same persons or things doing that action:
She looked at herself the mirror.
They did this to themselves.
The dog scratched itself.
Emphasize something about the subject of the sentence; in this usage, the reflexive pronoun usually immediately follows the subject but not always:
I myself don’t like spicy food.
Children, you yourselves are responsible for this mess.
He can do this himself.
Do not use reflexive pronouns in these ways:
Don’t use them when the subject is different than the object:
Incorrect: He gave that book to myself. <Correct: He gave that book to me.>
Incorrect: I did that for herself. <Correct: I did that for her.>
Don’t use them as a hypercorrect subject, usually accidentally done in situations of a compound subject:
Incorrect: She and myself will head up the lesson for today. <Correct: She and I will head up the lesson for the day.>
Don’t make up reflexive pronouns that are not true pronouns; one hint is that reflexive pronouns are never possessive:
Incorrect: He did it hisself.
Incorrect: They made it theirselves.
*Exception: You can use the word “themself” when the singular subject of the sentence is gender neutral or when you don’t know the gender: “The leader might think themself a fool.” However, many writers still use the plural “themselves.”
On the writing front, I’m about 2,000 words away from finishing book 4, Nathan and Sophia’s story. Then the rewrites begin, which is truly my favorite part of writing.
I will leave you with one of my beloved reflexive-pronoun examples, from Dr. Seuss’s How the Grinch Stole Christmas: “And he, he himself ... the Grinch … carved the roast-beast.”
Please tell me your grammar pet peeves. I’m making a list for future newsletter/blog topics.