[Lingtyp] Definition of “personal pronoun"

[tangzhengda]

Hi, Ian


Great quesition!


The primary function of personal pronouns is to be associated with speech roles. So the prototypical personal pronouns may  be dialogistically defined as shifters, to 'refer' to only addressors and addressees, socalled 1st and 2nd person pronouns. And 3rd person is often negatively defined as to be non-addressor and non-addressee. YOur question may also be related to the situation why a considerable proportion of languages in the world lack what are traditionally defined as third-person pronouns. 


However, 3rd person pronoun, if any, is systemically different from demonstratives, interrogatives, and NPs even if the latter can 'refer' to non-1 or non-2 person, such as morphological structures, syntactic behaviors.



Jeremy

--





Institute of Linguistics, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences,
No.5 Jianguomennei Dajie, Beijing, China; 100732




At 2021-07-06 12:53:09, "JOO, Ian [Student]" <ian.joo at connect.polyu.hk> wrote:

Dear typologists,

I’m having a hard time trying to find a definition of a “personal pronoun”.
One definition is that a personal pronoun refers to a literal person, a human being. But then again, non-human pronouns like English it are also frequently included as a personal pronoun.
Another definition seems to be that “personal” refers to a grammatical person and not a literal person. Thus, it refers to the (non-human) 3rd person, therefore it is a personal pronoun.
But then again, demonstratives, interrogative, and indefinite pronouns also refer to the 3rd person. (This is a book, who is that man, anything is possible) Then are they also personal pronouns?
What’s the clearest definition of a personal pronoun, if any?

From Hong Kong,
Ian


Disclaimer:

This message (including any attachments) contains confidential information intended for a specific individual and purpose. If you are not the intended recipient, you should delete this message and notify the sender and The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (the University) immediately. Any disclosure, copying, or distribution of this message, or the taking of any action based on it, is strictly prohibited and may be unlawful.

The University specifically denies any responsibility for the accuracy or quality of information obtained through University E-mail Facilities. Any views and opinions expressed are only those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent those of the University and the University accepts no liability whatsoever for any losses or damages incurred or caused to any party as a result of the use of such information.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/lingtyp/attachments/20210706/79c4afda/attachment.htm>