Editing Declension (section)

===Pronouns===
[[Pronouns]] in English have more complex declensions. For example, the [[First person pronoun|first person]] "[[wikt:I|I]]":

{|class="wikitable"
|-
 ! 
 ! Singular
 ! Plural
|-
 ! Subjective
 | I
 | we
|-
 ! Objective
 | me
 | us
|-
 ! Dependent possessive
 | my
 | our
|-
 ! Independent possessive
 | mine
 | ours
|}

Whereas nouns do not distinguish between the [[nominative case|subjective (nominative)]] and [[oblique case|objective (oblique)]] cases, some pronouns do; that is, they decline to reflect their relationship to a [[verb]] or [[preposition]], or [[grammatical case|case]]. Consider the difference between ''he'' (subjective) and ''him'' (objective), as in "He saw it" and "It saw him"; similarly, consider ''[[Who (pronoun)|who]]'', which is subjective, and the objective ''whom'' (although it is increasingly common to use ''who'' for both).

The one situation where [[gender]]{{NoteTag|Gender in English is not [[grammatical gender|grammatical]] but [[natural gender]].}} is still clearly part of the English language is in the pronouns for the third person singular. Consider the following:

{|class="wikitable"
|-
 ! rowspan="2" | 
 ! rowspan="2" | Masculine
 ! rowspan="2" | Feminine
 ! colspan="2" | Neuter
|-
 ! non-person
 ! person
|-
 ! Subjective
 | he
 | she
 | rowspan="2" | it
 | they
|-
 ! Objective
 | him
 | rowspan="2" | her
 | them
|-
 ! Dependent possessive
 | rowspan="2" | his
 | rowspan="2" | its
 | their
|-
 ! Independent possessive
 | hers
 | theirs
|}

The distinguishing of neuter for persons and non-persons is peculiar to English. This has existed since the 14th century.<ref name="Butterfield p814">{{Cite book|page=814|last1=Fowler |first1=H.W.|editor1-last=Butterfield |editor1-first=Jeremy|title= Fowler's Dictionary of Modern English Usage |date=2015 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-966135-0}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Huddleston |first1=Rodney |author-link1=Rodney Huddleston |last2= Pullum |first2= Geoffrey K. |author-link2= Geoffrey Pullum|title=The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language |year=2002 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |location=Cambridge; New York |isbn=0-521-43146-8 |page=494 }}</ref> However, the use of ''[[singular they]]'' is often restricted to specific contexts, depending on the dialect or the speaker. It is most typically used to refer to a single person of unknown gender (e.g. "someone left their jacket behind") or a hypothetical person where gender is insignificant (e.g. "If someone wants to, then they should"). Its use has expanded in recent years due to increasing social recognition of persons who do not identify themselves as male or female<ref>{{cite news | title=The singular, gender-neutral 'they' added to the Associated Press Stylebook | author=Andrews, Travis M. | date=March 28, 2017 | newspaper=Washington Post | url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2017/03/28/the-singular-gender-neutral-they-added-to-the-associated-press-stylebook/}}</ref> (see [[Non-binary gender|gender-nonbinary]]). The ''singular they'' still uses plural verb forms, reflecting its origins.