DEMONSTRATIVE PRONOUN

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DEMONSTRATIVE PRONOUN. A PRONOUN that shows where something is in relation to speaker and listener. STANDARD ENGLISH has four demonstratives, paired and with number contrast; this/these here, that/those there. Some dialects have three (this, that, yon/yonder) and SCOTS has this, that, yon/yonder and its variant thon/thonder. The sets of three are comparable to LATIN hic this near me, iste that near you, ille that over there. For some grammarians, the term covers the demonstratives however used; for others, demonstrative pronouns (‘I like that’, ‘Give me some of these’) are distinguished from demonstrative determiners (‘I like that one’, ‘Who are these people?’). See DEIXIS.

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