GRAMMAR - PUNCTUATION - WHAT ARE PUNCTUATION MARKS?

Punctuation Marks
Punctuation marks are symbols that are used to aid the clarity and comprehension of written language. Some common punctuation marks are the period, comma, question mark, exclamation point, apostrophe, quotation mark and hyphen.

Punctuation Mark	Symbol	Definition	Examples
apostrophe	'	An apostrophe is used as a substitute for a missing letter or letters in a word (as in the contraction cannot = can't), to show the possessive case (Jane's room), and in the plural of letters, some numbers and abbreviations. Note: groups of years no longer require an apostrophe (for example, the 1950s or the 90s).	I can't see the cat's tail. Dot your i's and cross your t's. 100's of years.
colon	:	A colon is used before a list or quote. A colon is used to separate hours and minutes. A colon is used to separate elements of a mathematical ratio.	There are many punctuation marks: period, comma, colon, and others. The time is 2:15. The ratio of girls to boys is 3:2.
comma	,	A comma is used to separate phrases or items in a list.	She bought milk, eggs, and bread.
dash	—	A dash is used to separate parts of a sentence.	The dash is also known as an "em dash" because it is the length of a printed letter m — it is longer than a hyphen.
ellipsis	...	An ellipsis (three dots) indicates that part of the text has been intentionally been left out.	0, 2, 4, ... , 100
exclamation point	!	An exclamation point is used to show excitement or emphasis.	It is cold!
hyphen	-	A hyphen is used between parts of a compound word or name. It is also used to split a word by syllables to fit on a line of text.	The sixteen-year-old girl is a full-time student.
parentheses	( )	Parentheses are curved lines used to separate explanations or qualifying statements within a sentence (each one of the curved lines is called a parenthesis). The part in the parentheses is called a parenthetical remark.	This sentence (like others on this page) contains a parenthetical remark.
period	.	A period is used to note the end of a declarative sentence.	I see the house.
question mark	?	A question mark is used at the end of a question.	When are we going?
quotation mark	"	Quotation marks are used at the beginning and end of a phrase to show that it is being written exactly as it was originally said or written.	She said, "Let's eat."
semicolon	;	A semicolon separates two independent clauses in a compound sentence. A semicolon is also used to separate items in a series (where commas are already in use).	Class was canceled today; Mr. Smith was home sick. Relatives at the reunion included my older brother, Bob; my cousin, Art; and my great-aunt, Mattie.

NOW…WRITE A SENTENCE SHOWING THE CORRECT USE OF EACH OF THE ABOVE.

PUNCTUATION EXERCISES

1.       DELETE incorrect punctuation and add correct punctuation where necessary.

(a)    You need only one thing in life, luck.

(b)   ‘Henry give me a hand with the dishes,’ pleaded Henrietta.

(c)    Cats communicate with their owners dogs talk to other dogs.

(d)   The book, that won the award, was incomprehensible to me.

(e)   He turns twenty one today.

(f)     The twins father was so proud.

(g)    We waited for the rain it didn’t come.

(h)   I love writers such as, Carver, Salinger, and Hemingway.

2.       PUNCTUATE this passage. Add capitals and paragraphs.

as the power dressed daughter knows best new woman strides down Collins st and into the 90s i flatten myself against a shop window and ponder the place of the passive in the next decade must i buy a  leather satchel and pad my shoulders to survive i doubt if the trappings of success can make a snapdragon out of a shrinking violet coming from an age when the meek were blessed and father knew best when children were seen and not heard and only seen if sanitized and smiling when pushy was frowned on and stepping back applauded I still balk at the high jumps of life.

GRAMMAR - PARTS OF SPEECH - ADJECTIVES - GOOD VS WELL, BAD VS BADLY

Good versus Well

In both casual speech and formal writing, we frequently have to choose between the adjective good and the adverb well. With most verbs, there is no contest: when modifying a verb, use the adverb. He swims well. He knows only too well who the murderer is. However, when using a linking verb or a verb that has to do with the five human senses, you want to use the adjective instead. How are you? I'm feeling good, thank you. After a bath, the baby smells so good. Even after my careful paint job, this room doesn't look good. Many careful writers, however, will use well after linking verbs relating to health, and this is perfectly all right. In fact, to say that you are good or that you feel good usually implies not only that you're OK physically but also that your spirits are high. "How are you?" "I am well, thank you."

Bad versus Badly

When your cat died (assuming you loved your cat), did you feel bad or badly? Applying the same rule that applies to good versus well, use the adjective form after verbs that have to do with human feelings. You felt bad. If you said you felt badly, it would mean that something was wrong with your faculties for feeling.

GRAMMAR - PARTS OF SPEECH - ADJECTIVES - I VS ME

Taller than I / me ??

When making a comparison with "than" do we end with a subject form or object form, "taller than I/she" or "taller than me/her." The correct response is "taller than I/she." We are looking for the subject form: "He is taller than I am/she is tall." (Except we leave out the verb in the second clause, "am" or "is.") Some good writers, however, will argue that the word "than" should be allowed to function as a preposition. If we can say "He is tall like me/her," then (if "than" could be prepositional like like) we should be able to say, "He is taller than me/her." It's an interesting argument, but — for now, anyway — in formal, academic prose, use the subject form in such comparisons. We also want to be careful in a sentence such as "I like him better than she/her." The "she" would mean that you like this person better than she likes him; the "her" would mean that you like this male person better than you like that female person. (To avoid ambiguity and the slippery use of than, we could write "I like him better than she does" or "I like him better than I like her.")

GRAMMAR - PARTS OF SPEECH - ADJECTIVES - LESS VS FEWER

Less versus Fewer

When making a comparison between quantities we often have to make a choice between the words fewer and less. Generally, when we're talking about countable things, we use the wordfewer; when we're talking about measurable quantities that we cannot count, we use the word less. "She had fewer chores, but she also had less energy." The managers at our local Stop & Shop seem to have mastered this: they've changed the signs at the so-called express lanes from "Twelve Items or Less" to "Twelve Items or Fewer." Whether that's an actual improvement, we'll leave up to you. We do, however, definitely use less when referring to statistical or numerical expressions: It's less than twenty miles to Dallas. He's less than six feet tall. Your essay should be a thousand words or less. We spent less than forty dollars on our trip. The town spent less than four percent of its budget on snow removal. In these situations, it's possible to regard the quantities as sums of countable measures.

GRAMMAR - PARTS OF SPEECH - ADJECTIVES

Definition

Adjectives are words that describe or modify another person or thing in the sentence. The Articles — a, an, and the — are adjectives.

• the tall professor
• the lugubrious lieutenant
• a solid commitment
• a month's pay
• a six-year-old child
• the unhappiest, richest man

If a group of words containing a subject and verb acts as an adjective, it is called an Adjective Clause. My sister, who is much older than I am, is an engineer. If an adjective clause is stripped of its subject and verb, the resulting modifier becomes an Adjective Phrase: He is the man who is keeping my family in the poorhouse.

Before getting into other usage considerations, one general note about the use — or over-use — of adjectives: Adjectives are frail; don't ask them to do more work than they should. Let your broad-shouldered verbs and nouns do the hard work of description. Be particularly cautious in your use of adjectives that don't have much to say in the first place: interesting, beautiful, lovely, exciting. It is your job as a writer to create beauty and excitement and interest, and when you simply insist on its presence without showing it to your reader — well, you're convincing no one.

Consider the uses of modifiers in this adjectivally rich paragraph from Thomas Wolfe's Look Homeward, Angel. (Charles Scribner's, 1929, p. 69.) Adjectives are highlighted in this color; participles, verb forms acting as adjectives, are highlighted in this blue. Some people would argue that words that are part of a name — like "East India Tea House — are not really adjectival and that possessive nouns — father's, farmer's — are not technically adjectives, but we've included them in our analysis of Wolfe's text.

He remembered yet the East India Tea House at the Fair, the sandalwood, the turbans, and the robes, the cool interior and the smell of India tea; and he had felt now the nostalgic thrill of dew-wet mornings in Spring, the cherry scent, the cool clarion earth, the wet loaminess of the garden, the pungent breakfast smells and the floating snow of blossoms. He knew the inchoate sharp excitement of hot dandelions in young earth; in July, of watermelons bedded in sweet hay, inside a farmer's covered wagon; of cantaloupe and crated peaches; and the scent of orange rind, bitter-sweet, before a fire of coals. He knew the good male smell of his father's sitting-room; of the smooth worn leather sofa, with the gaping horse-hair rent; of the blistered varnished wood upon the hearth; of the heated calf-skin bindings; of the flat moist plug of apple tobacco, stuck with a red flag; of wood-smoke and burnt leaves in October; of thebrown tired autumn earth; of honey-suckle at night; of warm nasturtiums, of a clean ruddy farmer who comes weekly with printed butter, eggs, and milk; of fat limp underdone bacon and of coffee; of a bakery-oven in the wind; of large deep-hued stringbeans smoking-hot and seasoned well with salt and butter; of a room of old pine boards in which books and carpets have been stored, long closed; of Concord grapes in their long white baskets.

An abundance of adjectives like this would be uncommon in contemporary prose. Too many adjectives are frowned on these days.

Position of Adjectives

Unlike Adverbs, which often seem capable of popping up almost anywhere in a sentence, adjectives nearly always appear immediately before the noun or noun phrase that they modify. Sometimes they appear in a string of adjectives, and when they do, they appear in a set order according to category. (See Below.) When indefinite pronouns — such as something, someone, anybody — are modified by an adjective, the adjective comes after the pronoun:

Anyone capable of doing something horrible to someone nice should be punished.
Something wicked this way comes.

And there are certain adjectives that, in combination with certain words, are always "postpositive" (coming after the thing they modify):

The president elect, heir apparent to the Glitzy fortune, lives in New York proper.

See, also, the note on a- adjectives, below, for the position of such words as "ablaze, aloof, aghast."

Degrees of Adjectives

Adjectives can express degrees of modification:

• Gladys is a rich woman, but Josie is richer than Gladys, and Sadie is the richest woman in town.

The degrees of comparison are known as the positive, the comparative, and the superlative. (Actually, only the comparative and superlative show degrees.) We use the comparative for comparing two things and the superlative for comparing three or more things. Notice that the word than frequently accompanies the comparative and the word the precedes the superlative. The inflected suffixes -er and -est suffice to form most comparatives and superlatives, although we need -ier and -iest when a two-syllable adjective ends in y (happier and happiest); otherwise we use more and most when an adjective has more than one syllable.

Click on the "scary bear" to read and hear George Newall's "Unpack Your Adjectives" (from Scholastic Rock, 1975). Schoolhouse Rock® and its characters and other elements are trademarks and service marks of American Broadcasting Companies, Inc. Used with permission.

Positive	Comparative	Superlative
rich	richer	richest
lovely	lovelier	loveliest
beautiful	more beautiful	most beautiful

Certain adjectives have irregular forms in the comparative and superlative degrees:

Irregular Comparative and Superlative Forms
good	better	best
bad	worse	worst
little	less	least
much many some	more	most
far	further	furthest

Be careful not to form comparatives or superlatives of adjectives which already express an extreme of comparison — unique, for instance — although it probably is possible to form comparative forms of most adjectives: something can be more perfect, and someone can have a fuller figure. People who argue that one woman cannot be more pregnant than another have never been nine-months pregnant with twins.

Grammar's Response

According to Bryan Garner, "complete" is one of those adjectives that does not admit of comparative degrees. We could say, however, "more nearly complete." I am sure that I have not been consistent in my application of this principle in the Guide (I can hear myself, now, saying something like "less adequate" or "more preferable" or "less fatal"). Other adjectives that Garner would include in this list are as follows:

absolute	impossible	principal
adequate	inevitable	stationary
chief	irrevocable	sufficient
complete	main	unanimous
devoid	manifest	unavoidable
entire	minor	unbroken
fatal	paramount	unique
final	perpetual	universal
ideal	preferable	whole

Be careful, also, not to use more along with a comparative adjective formed with -er nor to use most along with a superlative adjective formed with -est (e.g., do not write that something is more heavier or most heaviest).

The as — as construction is used to create a comparison expressing equality:

• He is as foolish as he is large.
• She is as bright as her mother.

Premodifiers with Degrees of Adjectives

Both adverbs and adjectives in their comparative and superlative forms can be accompanied by premodifiers, single words and phrases, that intensify the degree.

• We were a lot more careful this time.
• He works a lot less carefully than the other jeweler in town.
• We like his work so much better.
• You'll get your watch back all the faster.

The same process can be used to downplay the degree:

• The weather this week has been somewhat better.
• He approaches his schoolwork a little less industriously than his brother does.

And sometimes a set phrase, usually an informal noun phrase, is used for this purpose:

• He arrived a whole lot sooner than we expected.
• That's a heck of a lot better.

If the intensifier very accompanies the superlative, a determiner is also required:

• She is wearing her very finest outfit for the interview.
• They're doing the very best they can.

Occasionally, the comparative or superlative form appears with a determiner and the thing being modified is understood:

• Of all the wines produced in Connecticut, I like this one the most.
• The quicker you finish this project, the better.
• Of the two brothers, he is by far the faster.

For a QUIZ on Adjectives, go here...

With thanks to Capital Community College, a non-profit organisation.

GRAMMAR - PARTS OF SPEECH - PRONOUNS - 'WHICH' VERSUS 'THAT' and a QUIZ

WHICH VERSUS THAT

The word which can be used to introduce both restrictive and nonrestrictive clauses, although many writers use it exclusively to introduce nonrestrictive clauses; the word that can be used to introduce only restrictive clauses. Think of the difference between "The garage that my uncle built is falling down." and "The garage, which my uncle built, is falling down." I can say the first sentence anywhere and the listener will know exactly which garage I'm talking about — the one my uncle built. The second sentence, however, I would have to utter, say, in my back yard, while I'm pointing to the dilapidated garage. In other words, the "that clause" has introduced information that you need or you wouldn't know what garage I'm talking about (so you don't need/can't have commas); the "which clause" has introduced nonessential, "added" information (so you do need the commas). Incidentally, some writers insist that the word that cannot be used to refer to people, but in situations where the people are not specifically named, or if it refers to a group of people, it is acceptable. “The students that study most usually do the best.”

Take a Quiz on the 'which', 'that', 'who' pronouns here.

THE LORD OF THE FLIES - READING COMPREHENSION

The Lord of the Flies

CHARACTERS

RALPH

1.       Why do you think the boys chose Ralph as their leader?

2.      Was Ralph a good leader? Why/why not?

3.      What did Ralph mean when he became an outcast and said:  ‘cos I had some sense.’ (p.176)

PIGGY

4.      Was Piggy right when he said, unimpressed by the behaviour of the kids – ‘Like kids!’ (p.37)

5.      Was Ralph’s description of Piggy as the ‘true, wise friend…’ (p.192) a correct one?

6.      Piggy declared: ‘I know there isn’t no beast!’ (p.80). Was he right?

SIMON

7.      Why do you think it’s Simon who talks to the Lord of the Flies?

8.      Simon is the boy who confronts both of the beasts – the dead pilot and the LOTF. Why do the boys kill him when he tries to explain his discoveries?

9.      The writer, Golding, describes Simon as a ‘saint’. ‘…someone who voluntarily embraces this beast, goes…and tries to get rid of him and goes to give the good news to the ordinary bestial man on the beach and gets killed for it.’ Do you see Simon as a ‘saint’?

William Golding uses the image of the sea at key stages in the book to represent the solar system, the cosmos. For example, when Simon’s noble mission, to enlighten the boys, fails, and he is killed, he floats out to sea and becomes at one with the noble forces of the universe.

JACK

10.  Ralph represents man the preserver, Jack soon represents man the _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _.

11.  What are some of the things Jack does early in the novel?

12.  Why did the other boys, even though accepting Ralph as chief, soon see Jack as ‘the most obvious leader’ (p.22)

13.  One by one, the creative insight of Simon, the scientific thinking of Piggy and the moral authority of Ralph, all give way to the brute force of Jack and the boys who blindly follow him. Is this a comment on society as a whole? Why?

14.  In this context, what do ‘rocks’ symbolise?

THE AUTHOR’S IDEAL

Golding has said his purpose in Lord of the Flies was ‘to trace the defects of society back to the defects of human nature’. Each of the four main characters has his insight into human nature in his own, individual way.

Who’s who?

…smears his face with clay and peers into the water at his reflection. He looked in astonishment, no longer at himself but at an awesome stranger. (p.61)

In front of …. the Lord of the Flies hung on his stick and grinned. At last ..gave up and looked back…and his gaze was held by that ancient, inescapable recognition. (p.132)

‘With filthy matted hair, and unwiped nose, … wept for the end of innocence, the darkness of man’s heart.’

‘Which is better – to be a pack of painted niggers like you are, or to be sensible like Ralph is?...Which is better – to have rules and agree, or to hunt and kill?’ (p.171)

Who do you measure yourself against – Jack, Ralph, Piggy or Simon?

Golding has demonstrated a choice for society – between order and disorder – between brute force and the rule of law – between surrendering to our baser instincts and being ‘rescued’. Do you think society has heeded this message? Explain.

PARTS OF SPEECH - PRONOUNS

 

Bottom of Form

Definition

The word 'pronoun' is from the Latin 'pronomen' which means 'in place of a noun'. 

The main use of pronouns for a writer is that they prevent the needless repetition of nouns.

Generally (but not always) pronouns stand for (pro + noun) or refer to a noun, an individual or individuals or thing or things (the pronoun's antecedent) whose identity is made clear earlier in the text. For instance, we are bewildered by writers who claim something like:

·         They say that eating beef is bad for you.

They is a pronoun referring to someone, but who are they? Cows? Whom do they represent? Sloppy use of pronouns is unfair.

Not all pronouns will refer to an antecedent, however.

·         Everyone here earns over a thousand dollars a day.

The word "everyone" has no antecedent.

This section will list and briefly describe the several kinds of pronouns.

There are several kinds of pronouns: Personal, Demonstrative, Indefinite, Relative, Reflexive, Intensive, Interrogative, Reciprocal.

Personal Pronouns

Unlike English nouns, which usually do not change form except for the addition of an -s ending to create the plural or the apostrophe + s to create the possessive, personal pronouns (which stand for persons or things) change form according to their various uses within a sentence. Thus I is used as the subject of a sentence (I am happy.), me is used as an object in various ways (He hit me. He gave me a book. Do this for me.), and my is used as the possessive form (That's my car.) The same is true of the other personal pronouns: the singular you and he/she/it and the plural we, you, and they. These forms are called cases.

Personal pronouns can also be characterized or distinguished by person. First person refers to the speaker(s) or writer(s) ("I" for singular, "we" for plural). Second person refers to the person or people being spoken or written to ("you" for both singular and plural). Third person refers to the person or people being spoken or written about ("he," "she," and "it" for singular, "they" for plural). As you can see, each person can change form, reflecting its use within a sentence. Thus, "I" becomes "me" when used as an object ("She left me") and "my" when used in its possessive role (That's my car"); "they" becomes "them" in object form ("I like them") and "their" in possessive ("That's just their way").

When a personal pronoun is connected by a conjunction to another noun or pronoun, its case does not change. We would write "I am taking a course in Asian history"; if Talitha is also taking that course, we would write "Talitha and I are taking a course in Asian history." (Notice that Talitha gets listed before "I" does. This is one of the few ways in which English is a "polite" language.) The same is true when the object form is called for: "Professor Vendetti gave all her books to me"; if Talitha also received some books, we'd write "Professor Vendetti gave all her books to Talitha and me."

When a pronoun and a noun are combined (which will happen with the plural first- and second-person pronouns), choose the case of the pronoun that would be appropriate if the noun were not there.

·         We students are demanding that the administration give us two hours for lunch.

·         The administration has managed to put us students in a bad situation.

With the second person, we don't really have a problem because the subject form is the same as the object form, "you":

·         "You students are demanding too much."

·         "We expect you students to behave like adults."

Among the possessive pronoun forms, there is also what is called the nominative possessive: mine, yours, ours, theirs.

·         Look at those cars. Theirs is really ugly; ours is beautiful.

·         This new car is mine.

·         Mine is newer than yours.

Demonstrative Pronouns

The family of demonstratives (this/that/these/those/such) can behave either as pronouns or as determiners.

As pronouns, they identify or point to nouns.

·         That is incredible! (referring to something you just saw)

·         I will never forget this. (referring to a recent experience)

·         Such is my belief. (referring to an explanation just made)

As determiners, the demonstratives adjectivally modify a noun that follows. A sense of relative distance (in time and space) can be conveyed through the choice of these pronouns/determiners:

·         These [pancakes sitting here now on my plate] are delicious.

·         Those [pancakes that I had yesterday morning] were even better.

·         This [book in my hand] is well written;

·         That [book that I'm pointing to, over there, on the table] is trash.

A sense of emotional distance or even disdain can be conveyed with the demonstrative pronouns:

·         You're going to wear these?

·         This is the best you can do?

Pronouns used in this way would receive special stress in a spoken sentence.

When used as subjects, the demonstratives, in either singular or plural form, can be used to refer to objects as well as persons.

·         This is my father.

·         That is my book.

In other roles, however, the reference of demonstratives is non-personal. In other words, when referring to students, say, we could write "Those were loitering near the entrance during the fire drill" (as long as it is perfectly clear in context what "those" refers to). But we would not write "The principal suspended those for two days"; instead, we would have to use "those" as a determiner and write "The principal suspended those students for two days."

Relative Pronouns

The relative pronouns (who/whoever/which/that) relate groups of words to nouns or other pronouns (The student who studies hardest usually does the best.). The word who connects or relates the subject, student, to the verb within the dependent clause (studies). Choosing correctly between which and that and between who and whom leads to what are probably the most Frequently Asked Questions about English grammar. For help with which/that, refer to the Notorious Confusables article on those words (including the hyperlink to Michael Quinion's article on this usage and the links to relevant quizzes). Generally, we use "which" to introduce clauses that are parenthetical in nature (i.e., that can be removed from the sentence without changing the essential meaning of the sentence). For that reason, a "which clause" is often set off with a comma or a pair of commas. "That clauses," on the other hand, are usually deemed indispensable for the meaning of a sentence and are not set off with commas. The pronoun which refers to things; who (and its forms) refers to people; that usually refers to things, but it can also refer to people in a general kind of way.

The expanded form of the relative pronouns — whoever, whomever, whatever — are known as indefinite relative pronouns. A couple of sample sentences should suffice to demonstrate why they are called "indefinite":

·         The coach will select whomever he pleases.

·         He seemed to say whatever came to mind.

·         Whoever crosses this line first will win the race.

What is often an indefinite relative pronoun:

·         She will tell you what you need to know.

Indefinite Pronouns

The indefinite pronouns (everybody/anybody/somebody/all/each/every/some/none/one) do not substitute for specific nouns but function themselves as nouns (Everyone is wondering if any is left.)

One of the chief difficulties we have with the indefinite pronouns lies in the fact that "everybody" feels as though it refers to more than one person, but it takes a singular verb. (Everybody is accounted for.) If you think of this word as meaning "every single body," the confusion usually disappears. The indefinite pronoun none can be either singular or plural, depending on its context. None is nearly always plural (meaning "not any") except when something else in the sentence makes us regard it as a singular (meaning "not one"), as in "None of the food is fresh." Some can be singular or plural depending on whether it refers to something countable or noncountable.

There are other indefinite pronouns, words that double as Determiners:

enough, few, fewer, less, little, many, much, several, more, most, all, both, every, each, any, either, neither, none, some

·         Few will be chosen; fewer will finish.

·         Little is expected.

Intensive Pronouns

The intensive pronouns (such as myself, yourself, herself, ourselves, themselves) consist of a personal pronoun plus self or selves and emphasize a noun. (I myself don't know the answer.) It is possible (but rather unusual) for an intensive pronoun to precede the noun it refers to. (Myself, I don't believe a word he says.)

Reflexive Pronouns

The reflexive pronouns (which have the same forms as the intensive pronouns) indicate that the sentence subject also receives the action of the verb. (Students who cheat on this quiz are only hurting themselves. You paid yourself a million dollars? She encouraged herself to do well.) What this means is that whenever there is a reflexive pronoun in a sentence there must be a person to whom that pronoun can "reflect." In other words, the sentence "Please hand that book to myself" would be incorrect because there is no "I" in that sentence for the "myself" to reflect to (and we would use "me" instead of "myself"). A sentence such as "I gave that book to myself for Christmas" might be silly, but it would be correct.

Be alert to a tendency to use reflexive pronoun forms (ending in -self) where they are neither appropriate nor necessary. The inappropriate reflexive form has a wonderful name: the untriggered reflexive. "Myself" tends to sound weightier, more formal, than little ol' me or I, so it has a way of sneaking into sentences where it doesn't belong.

·         Bob and myself I are responsible for this decision.

·         These decisions will be made by myself me.

·         If you have any questions, please contact myself me or Bob Jones.

When pronouns are combined, the reflexive will take either the first person

·         Juanita, Carlos, and I have deceived ourselves into believing in my uncle.

or, when there is no first person, the second person:

·         You and Carlos have deceived yourselves.

The indefinite pronoun (see above) one has its own reflexive form ("One must have faith in oneself."), but the other indefinite pronouns use eitherhimself or themselves as reflexives. It is probably better to pluralize and avoid the clumsy himself or herself construction.

·         No one here can blame himself or herself.

·         The people here cannot blame themselves.

Interrogative Pronouns

The interrogative pronouns (who/which/what) introduce questions. (What is that? Who will help me? Which do you prefer?) Which is generally used with more specific reference than what. If we're taking a quiz and I ask "Which questions give you the most trouble?", I am referring to specific questions on that quiz. If I ask "What questions give you most trouble"? I could be asking what kind of questions on that quiz (or what kind of question, generically, in general) gives you trouble. The interrogative pronouns also act as Determiners: It doesn't matter which beer you buy. He doesn't know whose car he hit. In this determiner role, they are sometimes called interrogative adjectives.

Like the relative pronouns, the interrogative pronouns introduce noun clauses, and like the relative pronouns, the interrogative pronouns play a subject role in the clauses they introduce:

·         We know who is guilty of this crime.

·         I already told the detective what I know about it.

Reciprocal Pronouns

The reciprocal pronouns are each other and one another. They are convenient forms for combining ideas. If Bob gave Alicia a book for Christmas and Alicia gave Bob a book for Christmas, we can say that they gave each other books (or that they gave books to each other).

·         My mother and I give each other a hard time.

If more than two people are involved (let's say a whole book club), we would say that they gave one another books. This rule (if it is one) should be applied circumspectly. It's quite possible for the exchange of books within this book club, for example, to be between individuals, making "each other" just as appropriate as "one another."

Reciprocal pronouns can also take possessive forms:

·         They borrowed each other's ideas.

·         The scientists in this lab often use one another's equipment.

HOT TIPS FOR PRONOUNS:

Use 'which' for things, 'who' or 'whom' for people, and 'that' for things, or people in a group.

EXAMPLES: 

He repeated the joke, which I didn't think was funny the first time.

The student who loves grammar is a rare species.

Mr Bornhoffen is someone whom I have known since childhood.

It was the tutors' expertise that attracted me to this college.

The students that took part in the demonstration had the teachers' support.

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