The Classification of Words

(c'est moi — it's me) and cases like Moi et топ pere, nous
aimons ... — Me and my father, we
However that may be, at the present stage the unstressed personal pronouns can hardly be regarded either as being or as tending to become verbal morphemes similar to the -(e)s morpheme of the third person singular ⁸.
1. They may be used not only as subjects — That was h e. It is s h e. John is taller than I.
¹ But see Deskbook of Correct English by Michael West and P. F. Kim-
ber, Л., 1963, p. 130: "It is I" should be used in all formal writing and
where "/" is followed by "who" ("It's I who —"), but "It's me" may be
used in conversational contexts where no relative clause follows. So
also "It's her, — htm, — us, — them\"

2. 
   ^{B. A. Ilyish, op. cit, p 197, see also Л. С. Бархударов,
   Д, А. Ш т e л и h r, op. cit., p 78.}
   

2. 
   See А. И. С м и p н и ц к и и, op. cit., p 182—186.
   

101

2. 
   They can be coordinated with the help of conjunctions,
   which is not typical of morphemes. Neither h e nor I am
   likely to be present at the meeting (Hornby).
   
3. 
   They can be coordinated with nouns. Ma and I both
   ran inside. (Caldwell).
   
4. 
   They have some freedom of distribution. / forget. Do
   

1 ever forget? I do not easily forget, etc.
Neither can they be treated as word-morphemes partici­pating in the formation of analytical words. This is proved by the absence of a personal pronoun when a verb has a noun-subject. Thus we have Tom came, but not * Tom he came, which would be natural, if he came were an analytical word.
Thus it seems in keeping with language facts to treat the'' unstressed personal pronouns in the nominative case as in­dependent words
§ 148. As to the category of number, it should be Observed that strictly speaking, the personal pronouns have no cate­gory of number. / and we or he and they cannot be treated as number opposites inasmuch as they differ from each other not only grammatically, but lexically as well. We is not / + / but rather / and you, I and she, I and they, etc. They is not always lie + he, it may as well mean he + she. You is said to indicate both the singular and the plural. So it ought to be similar to cases like sheep, deer. But it is not.
2 sheep = 1 sheep + 1 sheep, in other words, sheep pi. = sheep
sg. + sheep sg. With you it is different. You pi. does not
always indicate you sg. + you sg. It may indicate you sg. +
+ he, you sg -|- they, etc.
Since / and we differ lexically, they do not belong to the same lexeme, they do not form an opposeme, and their num­ber meanings are not grammatical. But /, he, she, it form a group of words whose combinability resembles that of "singular" nouns. Cf. /, he, she, it, John, the student ... was (not were). . The pronouns we, you, they, on the contrary, have the combinability of "plural" nouns. We may then regard the pronouns of the first group as singularia tantum, and those of the other group as pluralia tantum '. In other words, the personal pronouns possess oblique or lexico-grammatical meanings of number.
¹ See "Nouns", § 74.
102
Similarly, we may speak of the lexico-grammatical mean­ing of person. The words /, me, we, us (as well as pronouns of other groups: my, mine, our, ours, myself, ourselves) are united by their reference to the first person, the speaker. Of these only / has grammatical combinability with am. Only the "singulars" (7, me, my, mine, myself) refer to the first person alone. The "plurals" include, besides the first person, reference to the second (/ and you), or the third (/ and he, she, or they), or both.
The words you, your, yours, yourself, yourselves are united by their reference to the second person, the hearer. But all of them (except yourself) may include reference to the third person as well (you and he, she or they). So in fact they are united negatively by not including reference to the first person.
The words he, him, she, her, it, they, them (also pronouns of other groups) are united by their reference to the third person, the 'spoken-of ¹, or negatively by not including reference to the first and second persons, the speaker and the hearer. Of these words he, she and it have explicit grammati­cal combinability (he speaks, she has ..., it is...).
The oblique grammatical meaning of 'third person' does not unite pronouns alone. All the nouns and noun equivalents are associated with this meaning.
Cf. He (she, it, John, Mary, rrtilk) is ..., not am.
This is the reason why nouns can be replaced by the pro­nouns he, she, it, they, but not by /, we, or you.
As to gender it is possible to discuss, for instance, the
lexico-grammatical subclass of the masculine gender only
in case we include pronouns of other groups, such as his,
himself, besides he (him). ^
The pronoun it is the only "personal" pronoun which in­dicates lifeless things or "non-persons". Together with its, itself, what, which, something, etc. it forms a subclass opposed to another subclass indicating persons (/, he, she, my, his, myself, herself, who, somebody, etc.).
§ 149. The combinability of the personal pronouns dif­fers from that of nouns. The reference to a particular person or thing makes all descriptions and limitations unnecessary. Such phrases as * The handsome it or * the he sound uncommon.
E. Nida. Morphology. Ann Arbor, 1946.
103
On the other hand, a personal pronoun usually replaces a noun with all its attributes.