You Know, I Learned Something Today

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-Germanic demonstrative base *''juz''-, *''iwwiz'' from PIE *''yu''- (second person plural pronoun). Old English had singular, dual, and plural second-person pronouns. The dual form was lost by the twelfth century, and the singular form was lost by the early 1600s. The development is shown in the following table.

Early Modern English distinguished between the plural '' ye'' and the singular ''thou''. As in many other European languages, English at the time had a T–V distinction, which made the plural forms more respectful and deferential; they were used to address strangers and social superiors. This distinction ultimately led to familiar ''thou'' becoming obsolete in modern English, although it persists in some English dialects.

''Yourself'' had developed by the early 14th century, with the plural ''yourselves'' attested from 1520.

Morphology

In Standard Modern English, ''you'' has five shapes representing six distinct word forms:
* ''you'': the nominative (subjective) and accusative (objective or oblique case) forms
* ''your:'' the dependent genitive (possessive) form
* ''yours'': independent genitive (possessive) form
* ''yourselves'': the plural reflexive form
* ''yourself'': the singular reflexive form

Plural forms from other varieties

Although there is some dialectal retention of the original plural ''ye'' and the original singular ''thou'', most English-speaking groups have lost the original forms. Because of the loss of the original singular-plural distinction, many English dialects belonging to this group have innovated new plural forms of the second person pronoun. Examples of such pronouns sometimes seen and heard include:
* ''y'all'', or ''you all'' – southern United States, African American Vernacular English, the Abaco Islands, St. Helena and Tristan da Cunha. ''Y'all'' however, is also occasionally used for the second person singular in the North American varieties.
* ''you guys'' u gajz~juɣajznbsp;– United States, particularly in the Midwest, Northeast, South Florida and West Coast; Canada, Australia. Gendered usage varies; for mixed groups, "you guys" is nearly always used. For groups consisting of only women, forms like "you girls" or "you gals" might appear instead, though "you guys" is sometimes used for a group of only women as well.
* ''you lot'' – UK, Palmerston Island, Australia
* ''you mob'' – Australia
* ''you-all, all-you'' – Caribbean English, Saba
* ''a(ll)-yo-dis'' – Guyana
* ''allyuh'' – Trinidad and Tobago
* ''among(st)-you'' – Carriacou, Grenada, Guyana, Utila
* ''wunna'' – Barbados
* ''yinna'' – Bahamas
* ''unu/oona'' – Jamaica, Belize, Cayman Islands, Barbados, San Salvador Island
* ''yous(e)'' – Ireland, Tyneside, Merseyside, Central Scotland, Australia, Falkland Islands, New Zealand, Philadelphia, parts of the midwest, Cape Breton and rural Canada
* ''yous(e) guys'' – in the United States, particularly in New York City region, Philadelphia, Northeastern Pennsylvania, and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan;
* '' you-uns, or'' ''yinz'' – Western Pennsylvania, The Ozarks, The Appalachians
* '' ye, yee,'' ''yees,'' ''yiz'' – Ireland, Tyneside, Newfoundland and Labrador

Semantics

''You'' prototypically refers to the addressee along with zero or more other persons, excluding the speaker. ''You'' is also used to refer to personified things (e.g., ''why won't you start?'' addressed to a car). ''You'' is always definite even when it is not specific.

Semantically, ''you'' is both singular and plural, though syntactically it is always plural: it always takes a verb form that originally marked the word as plural, (i.e. ''you are'', in common with ''we are'' and ''they are'').

Third person usage

''You'' is used to refer to an indeterminate person, as a more common alternative to the very formal indefinite pronoun '' one''. Though this may be semantically third person, for agreement purposes, ''you'' is always second person.
:Example: "''One'' should drink water frequently" or "''You'' should drink water frequently".

Syntax

Agreement

''You'' always triggers plural verb agreement, even when it is semantically singular.

Functions

''You'' can appear as a subject, object, determiner or predicative complement. The reflexive form also appears as an adjunct. ''You'' occasionally appears as a modifier in a noun phrase.
* Subject: ''You're there''; ''your being there''; ''you paid for yourself to be there.''
* Object: ''I saw you''; ''I introduced her to you; You saw yourself.''
* Predicative complement: ''The only person there was you.''
* Dependent determiner: ''I met your friend.''
* Independent determiner: ''This is yours.''
* Adjunct: ''You did it yourself.''
* Modifier: (no known examples)

Dependents

Pronouns rarely take dependents, but it is possible for ''you'' to have many of the same kind of dependents as other noun phrases.
* Relative clause modifier: ''you who believe''
* Determiner: ''the real you''; ''*the you''
* Adjective phrase modifier: ''the real you''; ''*real you''
* Adverb phrase external modifier: ''Not even you''

Pronunciation

According to the OED, the following pronunciations are used:

See also

* English personal pronouns
* Thou
* Generic you
* Y'all
* Yinz

References

{{Modern English personal pronouns, DIRECTOR=, INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY=

Modern English personal pronouns
Second-person plural pronouns in English
English pronouns
English words