Objective (grammar)
An
objective pronoun in
grammar functions as the target of a
verb, as distinguished from a
subjective pronoun, which is the initiator of a verb. Objective pronouns are instances of the
oblique case.
In the
English language, many objective pronouns are different from their corresponding
subjective pronouns — as an example, the following comparisons can be drawn: the word "I" can be compared to "me", "we" compared to "us", "he" compared to "him", "she" to "her", "who" to "
whom", and "they" to "them".
English once had an extensive
declension system that specified distinct pronouns for
accusative and
dative cases. This collapsed into a single pronoun for both accusative and dative cases, now called the
objective pronoun. Thus, many requirements for
declension in English concerning the objective and subjective pronouns have since mostly regressed.
Several relatively common usages of objective pronouns in the subject position are regarded as errors by
prescriptivists, though descriptive grammarians and linguists class such usages as
dialect and a natural part of language evolution. Various dialects of English often disregard subjective/objective pronoun distinctions in certain cases.
For example, to use the objective pronoun in a compound subject is traditionally considered grammatically incorrect by prescriptivists.
"Incorrect": You and me are going to school together.
"Correct": You and I are going to school together.
"Incorrect": The teacher teaches you and I.
"Correct": The teacher teaches you and me.
Also, using the objective pronoun for the second word in a comparison using the conjunction
than is traditionally considered incorrect if a subjective pronoun would be necessary in the "full" form of the sentence. This rule is very often disregarded in many varieties of English, to the point where a sentence constructed using "proper" grammar can, in some cases, be perceived as artificial or archaic to a native speaker.
"Incorrect": You are a better swimmer than her. (Than is used here as a preposition, as such it assigns objective case to its argument, 'her'.)
"Correct": You are a better swimmer than she. (
You are a better swimmer than she [is]. Prescriptivist English uses 'than' only as a conjunction.)
"Correct": They like you more than her. (
They like you more than [they like] her.)
Following a
copula (linking verb) with an objective pronoun is traditionally considered incorrect, following the logic that, as the subject and the object are the same, they should share the same case. Again, to some ears the first "correct" sentence below sounds artificial and awkward.
"Incorrect": The winner was me.
"Correct": The winner was I.
"Correct": I was the winner.
Finally, the word
whom, technically the objective form of
who, is falling into
disuse in some areas.
Who is commonly being used for both the objective and nominative cases, similar to the word
you.
"Incorrect": Who should I tell?
"Correct": Whom should I tell?
"Correct": Who should hear that?
It should be restated that labelling these differences "correct" and "incorrect" is a prescriptive response to dialectical differences from standard written English.
