Personal Pronouns

Summary
Jerry and Kimberly teach you about pronouns and antecedents.

Transcript
(Jerry is writing something on a piece of paper, while Kimberly is sitting on a chair, reading the newspaper)

Jerry: Kimberly and me went to the store...Kimberly and I went to the store...

(Confused, Jerry asks Kimberly for help)

Jerry: Hey, would you say "Kimberly and me went to the store" or "Kimberly and I went to the store"?

Kimberly: How about "We went to the store"?

Jerry: That wasn't even an option.

Caption: Today's Lesson: Personal Pronouns

Narrator: Today, Jerry and Kimberly are going to explain how you should use personal pronouns.

Jerry: A pronoun is a word that takes the place of a noun or another pronoun. Personal pronouns refer to people or things. For example...

(Jerry points to Kimberly)

Jerry: This is Kimberly. She is my friend. The word "she" is a pronoun that refers back to "Kimberly" and replaces it in the second sentence. We could just use Kimberly's name twice, but sometimes that sounds weird. The word that a pronoun refers to is called its antecedent. Personal pronouns have to agree with their antecedent in gender, number, and case. I couldn't say "he is my friend", because that wouldn't make sense.

Kimberly: That's right, because I'm female. Pronouns also have to agree with their antecedent in number. There's only one of me, so Jerry uses the singular pronoun, "she".

Jerry: If I wanted to go all plural, I could use a plural pronoun, and say, "we are friends". While we're on the subject of numbers, let's talk about the question I had earlier. Which is correct? "Kimberly and me went to the store" or "Kimberly and I went to the store"?

Kimberly: Now, there's a trick to this. If you're trying to figure out whether to use "I" or "me" when you're talking about yourself in conjunction with someone else, just try taking the other person out. Now, you wouldn't say "me went to the store". "I went to the store" is correct. So, the correct sentence is "Kimberly and I went to the store".

Jerry: Finally, the pronouns and its antecedent have to agree in something called case. There are three cases. Subject, object, and possessive. Subject case is when the pronoun is the subject, like, "She is my friend". Object case is when the pronoun is not the subject, but the object, like, "I have known her for a long time". And possessive case is when the pronoun tells you that something belongs to the antecedent, as in, "I am her friend".

Kimberly: Wait a minute. Aren't I your friend?

Jerry: Um...maybe.

Kimberly: Well, don't think too hard!