Monday, 26 October 2015

conjugation - Why are pronouns always given in the same order? I, you, he, etc?

It is the same in all other Indo-European languages I know. The perspective of any human being is with himself in the center: I. In any conversation, which is where language is important, there must be another human being present to whom I speak: you. Then we might discuss someone else: he/she/it.



The second set of pronouns is the same but in plural: I as an individual am a more basic, more important unit to myself than my group, we, which consists of several people. It is only logical to use the same order with plural pronouns as the one that is used with singular pronouns.



In Latin, there is a set of demonstrative pronouns for each of the three perspectives:




Hic = that which is closer to myself than to any of the other persons



Iste = that which is closest to you



Ille = that which closest to him




This is how they were originally used, when pointing to objects in the physical world ("deictically"); but they have acquired different nuances and their meanings have shifted a bit. In English, we only have two of those:




This = that which is closest to me or to you-and-I



That = that which is closest to you or him




Their meanings have shifted a bit as well.

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