In Modern English, ''they'' is a 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 ...

relating to a

grammatical subject The subject in a simple English sentence such as ''John runs'', ''John is a teacher'', or ''John drives a car'', is the person or thing about whom the statement is made, in this case ''John''. Traditionally the subject is the word or phrase whi ...

Morphology

Standard Standard may refer to: Symbols * Colours, standards and guidons, kinds of military signs * Standard (emblem), a type of a large symbol or emblem used for identification Norms, conventions or requirements * Standard (metrology), an object th ...

Modern English, ''they'' has five distinct 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 * ...

: * ''they'': 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) form * ''them'': the

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, 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 ...

'.) and a non-standard

determinative A determinative, also known as a taxogram or semagram, is an ideogram used to mark semantic categories of words in logographic scripts which helps to disambiguate interpretation. They have no direct counterpart in spoken language, though they may ...

form. * ''their:'' the dependent

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) form * ''theirs'': independent

form * ''themselves'': prototypical reflexive form *''themself'': derivative reflexive form (nonstandard; now chiefly used instead of "himself or herself" as a reflexive

epicenity Epicenity is the lack of gender distinction, often reducing the emphasis on the masculine to allow the feminine. It includes androgyny – having both masculine and feminine characteristics. The adjective ''gender-neutral'' may describe epicenit ...

for ''they'' in pronominal reference to a singular

referent A referent () is a person or thing to which a name – a linguistic expression or other symbol – refers. For example, in the sentence ''Mary saw me'', the referent of the word ''Mary'' is the particular person called Mary who is being spoken of, ...

)

History

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 '' hē'', which had both singular and plural forms, and ''they'' wasn't among them. In or about the start of the 13th century, ''they'' was imported from a Scandinavian source (

Old Norse Old Norse, Old Nordic, or Old Scandinavian, is a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and t ...

''þeir'',

Old Danish The Danish language developed during the Middle Ages out of Old East Norse, the common predecessor of Danish and Swedish. It was a late form of common Old Norse. The Danish philologist Johannes Brøndum-Nielsen divided the history of Danish into ...

Old Swedish Old Swedish (Swedish language, Modern Swedish: ) is the name for two distinct stages of the Swedish language that were spoken in the Middle Ages: Early Old Swedish (), spoken from about 1225 until about 1375, and Late Old Swedish (), spoken fro ...

''þer'', ''þair''), where it was a

masculine Masculinity (also called manhood or manliness) is a set of attributes, behaviors, and roles associated with men and boys. Masculinity can be theoretically understood as socially constructed, and there is also evidence that some behaviors con ...

plural The plural (sometimes abbreviated pl., pl, or ), in many languages, is one of the values of the grammatical category of number. The plural of a noun typically denotes a quantity greater than the default quantity represented by that noun. This de ...

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 ...

pronoun. It comes from

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 ...

*''thai'', nominative plural pronoun, 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 ...

*''to''-, demonstrative pronoun.

By Chaucer's time the ''th''- form has been adopted in London for the subject case only, whereas the oblique cases remain in their native form (''hem'', ''here'' < OE ''heom'', ''heora''). At the same period (and indeed before), Scots texts, such as Barbour's Bruce, have the ''th''- form in all cases.

The development in

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 ...

is shown in the following table. At the final stage, it had reached its modern form.

Singular ''they''

Singular ''they'' is a use of ''they'' as an

epicene Epicenity is the lack of gender distinction, often reducing the emphasis on the masculine to allow the feminine. It includes androgyny – having both masculine and feminine characteristics. The adjective ''gender-neutral'' may describe epicenit ...

(gender-neutral) pronoun for a singular

. In this usage, ''they'' follows plural agreement rules (''they are'', not *''they is''), but the

semantic Semantics (from grc, σημαντικός ''sēmantikós'', "significant") is the study of reference, meaning, or truth. The term can be used to refer to subfields of several distinct disciplines, including philosophy, linguistics and comput ...

reference Reference is a relationship between objects in which one object designates, or acts as a means by which to connect to or link to, another object. The first object in this relation is said to ''refer to'' the second object. It is called a ''name'' ...

is singular. Unlike plural ''they'', singular ''they'' is only used for

people A person (plural, : people) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as kinship, ownership of pr ...

. For this reason, it could be considered to have personal

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 ...

. Some people refuse to use the epicene pronoun ''they'' when referring to individuals on the basis that it is primarily a plural pronoun instead of a singular pronoun.

Word of the year

In December 2019,

Merriam-Webster Merriam-Webster, Inc. is an American company that publishes reference books and is especially known for its dictionaries. It is the oldest dictionary publisher in the United States. In 1831, George and Charles Merriam founded the company as ...

chose singular ''they'' as word of the year. The word was chosen because "English famously lacks a gender-neutral singular pronoun to correspond neatly with singular pronouns like everyone or someone, and as a consequence ''they'' has been used for this purpose for over 600 years."

Syntax

Functions

''They'' can appear as a

subject Subject ( la, subiectus "lying beneath") may refer to: Philosophy *''Hypokeimenon'', or ''subiectum'', in metaphysics, the "internal", non-objective being of a thing **Subject (philosophy), a being that has subjective experiences, subjective cons ...

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 ai ...

determiner A determiner, also called determinative (abbreviated ), is a word, phrase, or affix that occurs together with a noun or noun phrase and generally serves to express the reference of that noun or noun phrase in the context. That is, a determiner m ...

or predicative complement. The reflexive form also appears as an adjunct. * Subject: ''They're there; them being there; their being there; they allowed for themselves to be there.'' * Object: ''I saw them''; ''I directed her to them; They connect to themselves.'' * Predicative complement: ''In our attempt to fight evil, we have become them''; ''They eventually felt they had become themselves.'' * Dependent

: ''I touched their top''; ''them folks are helpful'' (non-standard) * Independent determiner: ''This is theirs.'' *Adjunct: ''They did it themselves.''

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 ''they'' 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: ''they who arrive late'' * Determiner: ''Sometimes, when you think, "I will show them," the them you end up showing is yourself.'' *

Adjective phrase An adjective phrase (or adjectival phrase) is a phrase whose head is an adjective. Almost any grammar or syntax textbook or dictionary of linguistics terminology defines the adjective phrase in a similar way, e.g. Kesner Bland (1996:499), Crystal (1 ...

modifier: ''the real them'' *

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 divi ...

external modifier: ''Not even them''

Semantics

Plural ''they'''s referents can be anything, including persons, as long as it doesn't include the speaker (which would require '' we'') or the addressee(s) (which would require ''

you In Modern English, ''you'' is the second-person pronoun. It is grammatically plural, and was historically used only for the dative case, but in most modern dialects is used for all cases and numbers. History ''You'' comes from the Proto- ...

''). Singular ''they'' can only refer to individual persons. Until the end of the 20th century, this was limited to those whose

is unknown (e.g., ''Someone's here. I wonder what they want''; ''That person over there seems to be waving their hands at us''.).

Generic

The pronoun ''they'' can also be used to refer to an unspecified group of people, as in ''In Japan they drive on the left.'' or ''They're putting in a McDonald's across the street from the Target.'' It often refers to the authorities, or to some perceived powerful group, sometimes sinister: ''They don't want the public to know the whole truth.''

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 com ...

, the following pronunciations are used:

In popular culture

Them Them or THEM, a third-person plural accusative personal pronoun, may refer to: Books * ''Them'' (novel), 3rd volume (1969) in American Joyce Carol Oates' ''Wonderland Quartet'' * '' Them: Adventures with Extremists'', 2003 non-fiction by Welsh ...

is a Northern Irish band.

References

{{Modern English personal pronouns Gender-neutral pronouns