you
you - English
Alternative forms
Pronunciation
- (unstressed)
- (Received Pronunciation) enPR: yo͞o, IPA: /ju/
- (General American, General Australian) enPR: yə, IPA: /jə/ help
- Homophones: ewe, u, yew, yu, hew (in h-dropping dialects), hue (in h-dropping dialects)
When a word ending in /t/, /d/, /s/, or /z/ is followed by you, these may coalesce with the /j/, resulting in /tʃ/, /dʒ/, /ʃ/ and /ʒ/, respectively. This is occasionally represented in writing, e.g. gotcha (from got you) or whatcha doin'? (more formally what are you doing?).
Pronoun
you (second person, singular or plural, nominative or objective, possessive determiner your, possessive pronoun yours, singular reflexive yourself, plural reflexive yourselves)
- (object pronoun) The people spoken, or written to, as an object.
- Both of you should get ready now.
- (reflexive, now US colloquial) (To) yourselves, (to) yourself.
- (object pronoun) The person spoken to or written to, as an object. (Replacing thee; originally as a mark of respect.)
- (subject pronoun) The people spoken to or written to, as a subject. (Replacing ye.)
- You are all supposed to do as I tell you.
- (subject pronoun) The person spoken to or written to, as a subject. (Originally as a mark of respect.)
- (indefinite personal pronoun) Anyone, one; an unspecified individual or group of individuals (as subject or object).
Usage notes
- Originally, you was specifically plural (indicating multiple people), and specifically the object form (serving as the object of a verb or preposition; like us as opposed to we). The subject pronoun was ye, and the corresponding singular pronouns were thee and thou, respectively. In some forms of (older) English, you and ye doubled as polite singular forms, e.g. used in addressing superiors, with thee and thou being the non-polite singular forms. In the 1600s, some writers objected to the use of "singular you" (compare objections to the singular they), but in modern English thee and thou are archaic and all but nonexistent and you is used for both the singular and the plural.
- Several forms of English now distinguish singular you from various marked plural forms, such as you guys, y'all, you-uns, or youse, though not all of these are completely equivalent or considered Standard English.
- The pronoun you is usually, but not always, omitted in imperative sentences. In affirmatives, it may be included before the verb (You go right ahead; You stay out of it); in negative imperatives, it may be included either before the don't, or (more commonly) after it (Don't you dare go in there; Don't you start now).
- The pronoun you is also used in an indefinite sense: the generic you.
- See English parts of speech for other personal pronouns.
Synonyms
- (subject pronoun: person spoken/written to):
- yer (UK eye dialect)
- plus the alternative forms listed above and at English personal pronouns
- (subject pronoun: persons spoken/written to; plural): See y'all
- (object pronoun: person spoken/written to): thee (singular, archaic), ye, to you, to thee, to ye
- (object pronoun: persons spoken/written to): ye, to you, to ye, to you all
- (one): one, people, they, them
Derived terms
Descendants
Translations
Determiner
you
- The individual or group spoken or written to.
- Have you gentlemen come to see the lady who fell backwards off a bus?
- Used before epithets, describing the person being addressed, for emphasis.
- You idiot!
Derived terms
Translations
Verb
you (third-person singular simple present yous, present participle youing, simple past and past participle youed)
- (transitive) To address (a person) using the pronoun you (in the past, especially to use you rather than thou, when you was considered more formal).
Translations
Noun
you (plural yous)
- The name of the Latin-script letter U.
Alternative forms
you - Cameroon Pidgin
Alternative forms
Pronunciation
- IPA: /ju/
Pronoun
you
you - Japanese
Romanization
you
you - Karawa
Noun
you
you - Leonese
Pronoun
you
you - Mandarin
Romanization
- Hanyu Pinyin reading of 喲/哟
Romanization
you
- Nonstandard spelling of yōu.
- Nonstandard spelling of yóu.
- Nonstandard spelling of yǒu.
- Nonstandard spelling of yòu.
Usage notes
- Transcriptions of Mandarin into the Latin script often do not distinguish between the critical tonal differences employed in the Mandarin language, using words such as this one without indication of tone.
you - Middle English
Pronoun
you
- Alternative form of yow
Pronoun
you
- (chiefly Northern and East Midland dialectal) Alternative form of þou
you - Mirandese
Pronunciation
- IPA: /jow/
Pronoun
you
- I (the first-person singular pronoun)
you - Pouye
Noun
you
you - Takia
Noun
you
you - Terebu
Noun
you