What is Reflexive Pronoun? Reflexive Pronouns List and Example Sentences

What is Reflexive Pronoun? Reflexive Pronouns List and Example Sentences

Reflexive Pronouns

Reflexive pronouns are words that end in “-self” or “-selves”, which are used when the object and subject of a sentence are the same. There are nine reflexive pronouns in English. The aforementioned words can be listed as “myself, yourself, himself, herself, oneself, itself, ourselves, yourselves, themselves”. Reflexive pronouns are used to capture simplicity in a sentence or paragraph. Otherwise, we would be making clumsy sentences.

Reflexive Pronouns Can Be Direct or Indirect Objects

A reflexive pronoun can be a direct object in a sentence when the subject and direct objects are one and both the same. Let’s give an example of this.

Mike divided to reward Elsa with breakfast out.

Mike decided to reward himself with breakfast out.

Elsa is the first sentence of the examples given above is the object of the award. Mike, that is, the subject is the object of the prize in the second sentence. That’s why we use the pronoun itself.

Reflexive pronouns can also take the role of the indirect object in a sentence.

Angel prepares a nice dinner for me every evening.

Angel prepares himself a nice dinner every evening.

It should be noted that it seems a bit odd to refer to the same noun twice as object and subject. For example, the sentence “Abraham poured a cup of coffee for Abraham” may sound frustrating to a native English speaker. This is why we need reflexive pronouns.

Reflexive Pronouns as Intensive Pronouns

Intensive pronouns are reflexive pronouns used to emphasize the subject or premise of a sentence and generally used to mean “no one else”. You can tell that a word ending in “-self” or “-selves” is used as an intensive pronoun because the sentence it’s in doesn’t change noticeably in meaning if you remove it.

Example sentences on the topic:

David prepared his breakfast yesterday morning.

No one else made his homework this for him.

We had to sew the yellow-colored dresses ourselves for our graduation.

-Perhaps the person who will sew the clothes is sick.

Examples of Reflexive Pronouns

He often goes alone to the cinema in the center of the city.

Do you enjoy playing games by yourself?

– In the two examples given above, the by + reflexive pronoun pattern is used.

 

They buy themselves a new sports car.

They buy each other red roses on Valentine’s Day.

– In the two examples given above, are aimed to emphasize the difference between plural reflexive and reciprocal pronouns. In reciprocal pronouns, each individual does the action to another, but not to himself.

 

He broke his hand while exercising last week, so he couldn’t cook and feed himself.

-The reflexive pronoun used in the example sentence given above has been added for emphasis.

 

The red sports car was in the garage of the house. I parked it myself.

Did you build your home in Miami yourself?

-We can use the emphasis method in the examples given above to emphasize that someone did it personally, not someone else.