Thursday, December 18, 2014

Pronoun Perplexity: Objective vs Subjective

My graduate student was sharing the cost of a wedding gift with several friends.  He wrote these two sentences about choosing a gift card:
This situation occurred to my friends and I . .
 The store had a variety of items that him and his
fiance could purchase . . .
I could overlook one pronoun offense, but the second one a few lines later meant that he was away the day that they taught objective pronouns in grade school.  

Being in Canada, I also considered that either his friend was in a gay marriage (fianc
é) or he didn't know how to spell fiancée.  But back to the pronouns:

Use "me" when the pronoun is the object of a verb.
"Give me the vodka."
Use "me" when the pronoun is the object of a preposition.
"He gave the vodka to me."
It doesn't matter if he gave the vodka to you and a half a dozen of your friends.  You still use the objective case (me).

Circle the correct pronoun:

  1. Give (me, I) and my fiancée the present.
  2. This machete was given to my friends and (me, I).
  3. My friends and (me, I) gave a casket full of machetes to the bride and groom.
  4. The store had several wedding rings that (him, he) and his boyfriend could admire.
  5. Proofread specifically for objective pronouns before you send your letter of intent to the Graduate Studies Department and (me, I), providing you want to write better, dammit.

Answers:  me, me, I, he, me

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