In
Modern English, ''it'' is a
singular
Singular may refer to:
* Singular, the grammatical number that denotes a unit quantity, as opposed to the plural and other forms
* Singular homology
* SINGULAR, an open source Computer Algebra System (CAS)
* Singular or sounder, a group of boar, ...
,
neuter,
third-person pronoun
In linguistics and grammar, a pronoun (abbreviated ) is a word or a group of words that one may substitute for a noun or noun phrase.
Pronouns have traditionally been regarded as one of the parts of speech, but some modern theorists would not co ...
.
Morphology
In Modern English, ''it'' has only three shapes representing five word
forms
Form is the shape, visual appearance, or configuration of an object. In a wider sense, the form is the way something happens.
Form also refers to:
*Form (document), a document (printed or electronic) with spaces in which to write or enter data
* ...
:
* ''it'': the
nominative
In grammar, the nominative case (abbreviated ), subjective case, straight case or upright case is one of the grammatical cases of a noun or other part of speech, which generally marks the subject of a verb or (in Latin and formal variants of Engl ...
(subjective) and
accusative
The accusative case (abbreviated ) of a noun is the grammatical case used to mark the direct object of a transitive verb.
In the English language, the only words that occur in the accusative case are pronouns: 'me,' 'him,' 'her,' 'us,' and ‘the ...
(objective) forms. (The accusative case is also called the "
oblique
Oblique may refer to:
* an alternative name for the character usually called a slash (punctuation) ( / )
*Oblique angle, in geometry
*Oblique triangle, in geometry
* Oblique lattice, in geometry
* Oblique leaf base, a characteristic shape of the b ...
".
)
* ''its:'' the dependent and independent
genitive
In grammar, the genitive case (abbreviated ) is the grammatical case that marks a word, usually a noun, as modifying another word, also usually a noun—thus indicating an attributive relationship of one noun to the other noun. A genitive can al ...
(possessive) forms
* ''itself'': the
reflexive form
Historically, though, the morphology is more complex.
History
Old English
Old English
Old English (, ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the early Middle Ages. It was brought to Great Britain by Anglo-Saxon settlement of Britain, Anglo ...
had a single third-person pronoun – from the
Proto-Germanic
Proto-Germanic (abbreviated PGmc; also called Common Germanic) is the reconstructed proto-language of the Germanic branch of the Indo-European languages.
Proto-Germanic eventually developed from pre-Proto-Germanic into three Germanic branc ...
demonstrative
Demonstratives (abbreviated ) are words, such as ''this'' and ''that'', used to indicate which entities are being referred to and to distinguish those entities from others. They are typically deictic; their meaning depending on a particular frame ...
base *''khi''-, from
PIE
A pie is a baked dish which is usually made of a pastry dough casing that contains a filling of various sweet or savoury ingredients. Sweet pies may be filled with fruit (as in an apple pie), nuts ( pecan pie), brown sugar ( sugar pie), swe ...
*''ko''- "this" – which had a plural and three
genders in the singular. The modern pronoun ''it'' developed out of the neuter, singular. The older pronoun had the following forms:
This neuter pronoun, like the masculine and feminine ones, was used for both people and objects (inanimate or abstract).
Common noun
A proper noun is a noun that identifies a single entity and is used to refer to that entity (''Africa'', ''Jupiter'', ''Sarah'', ''Microsoft)'' as distinguished from a common noun, which is a noun that refers to a class of entities (''continent, ...
s in Anglo-saxon had
grammatical gender
In linguistics, grammatical gender system is a specific form of noun class system, where nouns are assigned with gender categories that are often not related to their real-world qualities. In languages with grammatical gender, most or all nouns ...
s, which were not necessarily the same as the gender of the person(s) referred to (though they tended to accord with the endings of the words). For instance, Old-english (the ancestor of "child", pronounced "chilled") is neuter, as are both and , literally "male-child" and "female-child" (grammatical gender survives here; some 21st-century English speakers still use "it" with "child", see below).
The word , (which meant "female", ancestor of
"wife" as in "fishwife"), is also neuter. ("Man") was grammatically male, but
meant "a person", and could, like , be qualified with a gender. (variant , ancestor of "woman") meant "female person" and was grammatically masculine, like its last element, , and like (variant , "male person").
Archbishop Ælfric's Latin vocabulary gives three Anglo-saxon words for an
intersex
Intersex people are individuals born with any of several sex characteristics including chromosome patterns, gonads, or genitals that, according to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, "do not fit typical bina ...
person, (dialectical "skratt", grammatically masculine), (grammatically feminine, like its last element, ), and (grammatically masculine).
Similarly, because is feminine, so are (inhabitants of a region), (inhabitants of heaven), and (inhabitants of hell). is neuter, feminine, and both mean "the
Angles
The Angles ( ang, Ængle, ; la, Angli) were one of the main Germanic peoples who settled in Great Britain in the post-Roman period. They founded several kingdoms of the Heptarchy in Anglo-Saxon England. Their name is the root of the name ...
, the English people". Nouns for inanimate objects and abstract concepts also had (grammatical) genders.
Mark Twain parodied this grammatical structure (which still exists in
German
German(s) may refer to:
* Germany (of or related to)
** Germania (historical use)
* Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language
** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law
**Ge ...
) by rendering it literally into modern English:
About half of the world's languages have gender, and there is a continuum between those with more
grammatical gender
In linguistics, grammatical gender system is a specific form of noun class system, where nouns are assigned with gender categories that are often not related to their real-world qualities. In languages with grammatical gender, most or all nouns ...
(based on word form, or quite arbitrary), and those with more
natural gender
In linguistics, grammatical gender system is a specific form of noun class system, where nouns are assigned with gender categories that are often not related to their real-world qualities. In languages with grammatical gender, most or all nouns ...
(based on word meaning). The concept of natural gender was beginning to develop in Old English, occasionally conflicting with the established grammatical gender. This development was, however, mostly to take place later, in Middle English.
Middle English ( 1066-1400s)
In the 12th century, ''it'' started to separate and appear without an ''h''. Around the same time, one case was lost, and distinct pronouns started to develop, so that by the 15th century (late
Middle English
Middle English (abbreviated to ME) is a form of the English language that was spoken after the Norman conquest of 1066, until the late 15th century. The English language underwent distinct variations and developments following the Old English p ...
), the forms of ''it'' were as follows:
* Nominative: (''h'')''it''
* Accusative: (''h'')''it'' / ''him''
* Genitive: ''his''
* Reflexive:(''h'')''it self.'' Also ''-selfe, -selve''(''n'')'', -silf, -sijlfe'', sometimes without a space.
During the Middle English period,
grammatical gender
In linguistics, grammatical gender system is a specific form of noun class system, where nouns are assigned with gender categories that are often not related to their real-world qualities. In languages with grammatical gender, most or all nouns ...
was gradually replaced with
natural gender
In linguistics, grammatical gender system is a specific form of noun class system, where nouns are assigned with gender categories that are often not related to their real-world qualities. In languages with grammatical gender, most or all nouns ...
in English.
Modern English (a bit before 1550-present)
Middle English gradually gave way to
Modern English in the early 16th century. The ''hit'' form continued well into the 16th century but had disappeared before the 17th in formal written English.
Genitive ''its'' appeared in the later 16th century and had taken over by the middle of the 17th, by which time ''it'' had its modern form.
"Hit" remains in some dialects in
stressed positions only; some dialects also use "it", not "its", as a possessive.
Gender
''It'' is considered to be neuter or impersonal / non-personal in
gender
Gender is the range of characteristics pertaining to femininity and masculinity and differentiating between them. Depending on the context, this may include sex-based social structures (i.e. gender roles) and gender identity. Most cultures u ...
. In Old English, (''h'')''it'' was the neuter nominative and accusative form of ''hē''. But by the 17th century, the old
gender
Gender is the range of characteristics pertaining to femininity and masculinity and differentiating between them. Depending on the context, this may include sex-based social structures (i.e. gender roles) and gender identity. Most cultures u ...
system, which marked gender on
common nouns and
adjectives
In linguistics, an adjective (abbreviated ) is a word that generally modifies a noun or noun phrase or describes its referent. Its semantic role is to change information given by the noun.
Traditionally, adjectives were considered one of the mai ...
, as well as pronouns, had disappeared, leaving only pronoun marking. At the same time, a new
relative pronoun system was developing that eventually split between
personal
Personal may refer to:
Aspects of persons' respective individualities
* Privacy
* Personality
* Personal, personal advertisement, variety of classified advertisement used to find romance or friendship
Companies
* Personal, Inc., a Washington, ...
relative ''
who
Who or WHO may refer to:
* Who (pronoun), an interrogative or relative pronoun
* Who?, one of the Five Ws in journalism
* World Health Organization
Arts and entertainment Fictional characters
* Who, a creature in the Dr. Seuss book '' Horton He ...
'' and impersonal relative ''which''.
As a result some scholars consider ''it'' to belong to the impersonal gender, along with relative ''
which
Which may refer to:
* a relative pronoun
* an interrogative word
* which (command), an operating system command
*Which?, a UK charity and its magazine
See also
* English relative clauses
* Interrogative clause
* Whicher (disambiguation) Which ...
'' and interrogative ''
what
What or WHAT may refer to:
* What, an interrogative pronoun and adverb
* "What?", one of the Five Ws used in journalism
Film and television
* ''What!'' (film) or ''The Whip and the Body'', a 1963 Italian film directed by Mario Bava
* '' Wha ...
''.
Syntax
Functions
''It'' can appear as a
subject,
object
Object may refer to:
General meanings
* Object (philosophy), a thing, being, or concept
** Object (abstract), an object which does not exist at any particular time or place
** Physical object, an identifiable collection of matter
* Goal, an ...
,
determiner or a
predicative complement.
The reflexive form also appears as an
adjunct. ''It'' very seldom appears as a modifier.
* Subject:
''It''s there;
it being there;
its being there; it allows for
itself to be there.''
* Object: ''I saw
it''; ''I pointed her to
it; It connects to
itself.''
* Predicative complement: ''In our attempt to fight evil, we have become
it''; ''It took more than ten years it, to fully become
itself.''
* Determiner: ''I touched
its top.''
* Adjunct: ''It did it
itself.''
* Modifier: ''They were the
it crowd.''
Dummy ''it''
A
dummy pronoun
A dummy pronoun is a deictic pronoun that fulfills a syntactical requirement without providing a contextually explicit meaning of its referent. As such, it is an example of exophora.
Dummy pronouns are used in many Germanic languages, includ ...
is one that appears only for syntactic reasons and has no semantic value. One use of ''it'' is as a dummy pronoun (see also ''
there'') as in ''it's raining'' or ''it's clear that you understand''.
In Old English, a subject was not required in the way it is today. As the subject requirement developed, there was a need for something to fill it with verbs taking
zero arguments. Weather verbs such as ''rain'' or ''thunder'' were of this type, and, as the following example shows, dummy ''it'' often took on this role.
''Gif on sæternesdæg geðunrað, þaet tacnað demena and gerefena cwealm''
If on saturn's-day thunders, that portends judges' and sheriffs' death
If it thunders on Saturday, that portends the deaths of judges and sheriffs
But these were not the only such verbs. Most of the verbs used without a subject or with the dummy ''it'' belong to one of the following semantic groups:
# (a) Events or happenings (''chance'', ''happen'', ''befall'', etc.)
# (b) Seeming or appearance (''seem'', ''think'', ''become'', etc.)
# (c) Sufficiency or lack (''lack'', ''need'', ''suffice'', etc.)
# (d) Mental processes or states (''like'', ''list'', ''grieve'', ''please'', ''repent'', ''rue'', etc.)
And examples still remain, such as the expression ''suffice it to say''.
We see the same use of dummy ''it'' in
cleft constructions, such as ''it's obvious that you were there''.
Dependents
Pronouns rarely take
dependents
A dependant is a person who relies on another as a primary source of income. A common-law spouse who is financially supported by their partner may also be included in this definition. In some jurisdictions, supporting a dependant may enabl ...
, but it is possible for ''it'' to have many of the same kind of dependents as other
noun phrases
In linguistics, a noun phrase, or nominal (phrase), is a phrase that has a noun or pronoun as its head or performs the same grammatical function as a noun. Noun phrases are very common cross-linguistically, and they may be the most frequently occ ...
.
*
Relative clause
A relative clause is a clause that modifies a noun or noun phraseRodney D. Huddleston, Geoffrey K. Pullum, ''A Student's Introduction to English Grammar'', CUP 2005, p. 183ff. and uses some grammatical device to indicate that one of the arguments ...
modifier: ''That's not the it
that I meant''; ''*That's not it
that I meant.''
* Determiner: ''That's not
the it that I meant''; ''*That's not
the it.''
*
Adverb phrase
In linguistics, an ''adverbial phrase'' ("AdvP") is a multi-word expression operating adverbially: its syntactic function is to modify other expressions, including verbs, adjectives, adverbs, adverbials, and sentences. Adverbial phrases can be div ...
external modifier: ''
not even itself''
Semantics
''It'' is used to
denote
In linguistics and philosophy, the denotation of an expression is its literal meaning. For instance, the English word "warm" denotes the property of being warm. Denotation is contrasted with other aspects of meaning including connotation. For in ...
an
inanimate physical object, abstract concept, situation, action, characteristic, and almost any other concept or being, including, occasionally, humans.
''It'' is usually
definite
In linguistics, definiteness is a semantic feature of noun phrases, distinguishing between referents or senses that are identifiable in a given context (definite noun phrases) and those which are not (indefinite noun phrases). The prototypical d ...
and
specific
Specific may refer to:
* Specificity (disambiguation)
* Specific, a cure or therapy for a specific illness
Law
* Specific deterrence, focussed on an individual
* Specific finding, intermediate verdict used by a jury in determining the fina ...
, but ''it'' can also have no referent at all (See
Dummy ''it''). It can be debatable whether a particular use is a dummy ''it'' or not (for instance: "Who is it?" —"It's me!").
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Samuel Taylor Coleridge (; 21 October 177225 July 1834) was an English poet, literary critic, philosopher, and theologian who, with his friend William Wordsworth, was a founder of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lake ...
proposed using ''it'' in a wider sense in all the situations where a
gender-neutral pronoun
A third-person pronoun is a pronoun that refers to an entity other than the speaker or listener. Some languages with gender-specific pronouns have them as part of a grammatical gender system, a system of agreement where most or all nouns have a va ...
might be desired:
The children's author
E. Nesbit
Edith Nesbit (married name Edith Bland; 15 August 1858 – 4 May 1924) was an English writer and poet, who published her books for children as E. Nesbit. She wrote or collaborated on more than 60 such books. She was also a political activist a ...
consistently wrote in this manner, often of mixed groups of children: "Everyone got its legs kicked or its feet trodden on in the scramble to get out of the carriage."
['']Five Children and It
''Five Children and It'' is a children's novel by English author E. Nesbit. It was originally published in 1902 in the '' Strand Magazine'' under the general title ''The Psammead, or the Gifts'', with a segment appearing each month from April ...
'', p. 1. This usage (but in
all capital letters, as if an acronym) also occurs in
District of Columbia police reports.
Some people use
''it'' as a gender-neutral pronoun.
Pronunciation
According to the
OED
The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' (''OED'') is the first and foundational historical dictionary of the English language, published by Oxford University Press (OUP). It traces the historical development of the English language, providing a co ...
, the following pronunciations are used:
Popular culture
*
Stephen King
Stephen Edwin King (born September 21, 1947) is an American author of horror, supernatural fiction, suspense, crime, science-fiction, and fantasy novels. Described as the "King of Horror", a play on his surname and a reference to his high s ...
's 1986 book ''
It'' is about a shape shifting, malevolent entity that often manifests as a
clown
A clown is a person who performs comedy and arts in a state of open-mindedness using physical comedy, typically while wearing distinct makeup or costuming and reversing folkway-norms.
History
The most ancient clowns have been found in ...
.
* In games of
tag, the person trying to tag others is known as ''it''.
See also
*
Generic antecedents
Generic antecedents are representatives of classes, referred to in ordinary language by another word (most often a pronoun), in a situation in which gender is typically unknown or irrelevant. These mostly arise in generalizations and are particul ...
*
Gender-specific pronoun
A third-person pronoun is a pronoun that refers to an entity other than the speaker or listener. Some languages with gender-specific pronouns have them as part of a grammatical gender system, a system of agreement where most or all nouns have a va ...
*
English personal pronouns
The English personal pronouns are a subset of English pronouns taking various forms according to grammatical number, number, grammatical person, person, grammatical case, case and natural gender. Modern English has very little inflection of nouns ...
References
External links
* William Malone Baskervill and James Witt Sewel
''An English Grammar'' 1896.
On some Philological Peculiarities in the English Authorized Version of the Bible By Thomas Watts, Esq.
''
The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language
''The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language'' (''AHD'') is an American English, American dictionary of English published by Boston publisher Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Houghton Mifflin, the first edition of which appeared in 1969. ...
'', Fourth edition, (Boston:
Houghton Mifflin Company, 2000).
{{English gender-neutral pronouns
Modern English personal pronouns