Pronoun Antecedent Agreement—Lecture Notes
Background information—for pronoun/antecedent rules, we are looking at two parts of speech: nouns and pronouns.
Nouns are names for people, places, things, ideas, and qualities (e.g. Mr. Brown, Lamont, trees, democracy, beauty).
Pronouns are words that substitute for nouns.
The trees are losing theirleaves.
NOUNPRONOUN
PA Agreement
What follows is an explanation of what “Agreement” means when we are talking about pronouns and their antecedents (“antecedents” are the specific nouns that the pronouns are subbing for).
The relationship between a noun (called an antecedent when we are identifying that there is a connection between this particular noun and a pronoun) and a pronoun has one main rule:
Pronouns, when subbing for a noun, must match the number and gender of the noun (antecedent).
Thus, a pronoun that is subbing for a plural noun must be a plural pronoun:
The trees (plural noun) are losing their (plural pronoun) leaves.
This sentence—
“The trees(plural noun) are losing its (a singular pronoun) leaves.”—
demonstrates a pronoun/antecedent agreement error—the noun and pronoun don’t match in number.
Here are more examples of agreement between antecedents and pronouns:
The man is driving his car to work (singular antecedent = use singular pronoun)
Cindy is going to work. She was hired on Monday (singular antecedent = use singular pronoun)
In general, students don’t have a problem in matching by gender. Students know that the following singular nouns would use “he,” “him,” or “his” as a substitute: Mr. Brown, father, man, boy, etc. And students would know to use “she,” “her,” or “hers” as a substitute for these singular nouns: Mrs. Brown, mother, woman, girl, etc.
Three Common Errors in Antecedent Pronoun Agreement
1. Non-gender specific singular subjects:
In this class, the most common PA Agreement error occurs with non-gender specific nouns, which means that the noun is singular, but it doesn’t tell us if the person is male or female: person, boss, soldier, athlete, student, etc.
Because these could be either male or female, a writer who doesn’t know if the particular “person,” “boss,” “soldier,” “athlete,” or “student,” is male or female is forced to use the combination pronoun: he or she, him or her, his or her. This is bulky and writers would do well to avoid it. The way to avoid it is to use the plural form of the noun: people (not person), bosses (not boss), athletes (not athlete), students (not student).
Here is the common error:
A person who leaves their money in the open can easily be robbed.
Singular noun Plural pronoun
Here is the correction:
Since the antecedent (person) is singular, the pronoun must also be singular, but “their” is plural. The correct way to write a sentence with “person” is as follows:
A person who leaves his or her money in the open can easily be robbed.
Singular noun Singular pronouns
NOTE: Even though the above is correct, it is not preferable (but it is better than making an agreement error!).
Here is the best way to correct it—make the noun plural:
People who leave their money in the open can easily be robbed.
Plural noun Plural pronoun
2. Indefinite Pronouns:
Another common agreement erroroccurs withIndefinite Pronouns: everybody, somebody, anybody, nobody, no one, anyone, everyone, someone, each, every, nothing, everything, something, either, and neither.
NOTE: There is no plural form of these words.
Most students see these words as plural, but they are considered singular. So the pronouns that students use for the indefinite pronouns should be the bulky pronoun combinations of “he or she,” “him or her,” and “his or her.”
Here is the error with indefinite pronouns:
Everybody loves togo to Florida for their spring break.
Singular Plural
Nobody purposely leaves their Visa card at a restaurant.
SingularPlural
Here is the correction:
Everybody loves to go to Florida for his or her spring break.
Singular Singular pronouns
Nobody purposely leaves his or her Visa card at a restaurant.
SingularSingular pronouns
Here is thebest correction—do not use indefinite pronouns when you write:
Because there is no plural form for the indefinite pronoun and because writers should avoid the pronoun combinations of “he or she,” “him or her,” and “his or her,” students should avoid using indefinite pronouns.
Think who specifically you mean when you write words like “everybody.” Do you really mean everybody in the whole wide world? Probably not. Use the word that specifically identifies the group you mean.
Here is how you can correct the above sentence errors and avoid the “he or she” nonsense:
College students love to go to Florida for their spring break.
Plural noun Plural pronoun
Customers do not purposefully leave their Visa card at a restaurant.
Plural nounPlural pronoun
3. Collective Nouns:
Finally, the last common error in Pronoun Antecedent Agreement occurs with Collective Nouns. A collective noun is a word that usually identifies a group of people, but the noun itself is considered singular: team, committee, squad, family, organization, group, etc.
Here is the common error:
The tennisteamis celebratingtheirfifth championship.
SingularPlural pronoun
My family is having their reunion at HartPark.
Singular Plural pronoun
The error is that collective nouns (since they are singular and are not assigned gender) take the pronoun “it” or “its” (“its”is the possessive form).
Here is the correction:
The tennisteamis celebratingits fifth championship.
Singular noun Singular pronoun
My family is having its reunion at HartPark.
Singular noun Singular pronoun
NOTE: If you do not like referring to a team or family as “it” or “its,” then you can make revisions that permit you to use the plural pronoun “their.” Notice that in the sentences below, the collective nouns “team” and “family” have become part of a prepositional phrase and the new subject (members) is now the antecedent for “their.”
The members of tennis team are celebratingtheir fifth championship.
Plural noun Plural pronoun
Themembersof my family are having their reunion at Hart.
Plural noun Plural pronoun