Pronouns in German

Pronouns in German (Pronomen) is a short word that takes the place of a noun previously mentioned in the sentence, paragraph, or conversation. A pronoun substitutes for a noun or noun phrase and designates persons or things asked for, previously specified, or understood from context.

A specific pronoun in English as well as German has person, number, and case. You will be encountering all of the common German pronouns in the next several lessons, so we will track these as they appear. The following familiar personal pronouns are introduced in this lesson:

ich – I (1st person, singular, nominative case)
mich – me (1st person, singular, accusative case)
mir – me (1st person singular, dative case)
du – you (2nd person, singular, nominative case)
dich – you (2nd person, singular, accusative case)
dir – you (2nd person singular, dative case)
er – he (3rd person singular, nominative case)
sie – she (3rd person singular, nominative case)
es – it (3rd person singular, nominative case)

Pronoun person describes the relationship of the word to the speaker (that is, 1st person is the speaker; 2nd person is spoken to; and 3rd person is spoken about).

Pronoun number refers to whether the word represents one (singular) or more than one (plural) person or object.

Finally, case indicates how the pronoun is used in a sentence, as will be explained over the next several lessons. For now, note in the examples you have already encountered, the three cases of 1st person singular pronouns in German: ich, mich, and mir.

In English these are: ‘I’, ‘me’, and (to or with) ‘me’ — in essence, there are really just two cases in English: subjective (‘I’) and objective (‘me’). You will shortly see that there are similarities, yet distinct differences, in the cases as used by the English and German languages. 

Vocabularies

We hope to see in our next lessons and we hope you enjoyed our lesson today about Pronouns in German