Pronouns in Russian

 

Pronouns in Russian

In any language, we use pronouns to mention a noun without naming it. The Russian pronouns can be used instead of:

• Nouns.
• Adjectives.
• Numerals or adverbs.

Most of the pronouns in Russian change the form according to the case, gender and number.

Examples:

Э́то моя́ ручка, а э́то твоя́ книга́.

Я, он и она́ – вме́сте дружная семья.

Никто́ не любит молоко.

Не́сколько люде́й ждут автобус.

Listen to the pronunciation Here

Personal pronouns:

As we have seen, the pronouns have several lexical and grammatical categories, among which the personal pronouns. So, let’s list them:

Я (I), ты (You), он (He), она (She), оно (It), мы (We), вы (You), они (They).

The personal pronouns answer the following questions:

кто? – (who) что? – (what).

Examples:

Я ем. I’m eating.

Ты посмотрел фильм? Did you watch the movie?

Он любит спагетти. He likes spaghetti.

Она учит русский язык. She learns Russian.

Оно открыто. (Окно) It’s open. (window)

Listen to the Audio

Reflexive pronoun:

The meaning of this pronoun is so specific that it was listed as a separate category. The word себя́ “..self” indicates that the action that the speaker performs is directed at himself / herself, that is, it returns to the actor. For this reason, the pronoun is called “reflexive“. So, in few words in Russian, the reflexive pronoun себя́ “…self” indicates the attitude of a person to him/ herself.

Example:

PS: You may have noticed that some verbs in Russian end in ся – this type of verbs is called reflexive verbs and have a quite similar meaning as the reflexive pronoun.

Example of reflexive verbs:

Одеваться (get dressed), мыться (to wash)

Let’s compare:

Кот моется лапкой. — Кот моет себя лапкой.

A reflexive pronoun can refer to one or more persons:

Grammatical features of a reflexive pronoun

The reflexive pronoun replaces the noun and answer questions such as (each of the following questions refers to a specific case) :

кого? whom?

кому? To whom?

кем? By whom?

о ком? About whom?

Notice: The reflexive pronoun себя “…self” has no initial nominative case. It doesn’t have gender, number.

Examples :

Я готовлю себе ужин. I’m cooking dinner for myself.

Check out the Declensions of the pronouns in Russian Here