代词和人称代词
Pronouns and personal pronouns

第一课你就说了“我”和“你”，第六课学了“我们、你们、他们”，对老师你会说“您好”。这些小词你天天在用，从来没有想过它们是一类词。它们叫代词——替别的词站着的词。今天先讲最常用的一类：人称代词。

You said 我 and 你 in your first lesson, learned 我们, 你们, 他们 in the sixth, and greet a teacher with 您好. You use these little words daily and have never had to think of them as a class. The class is 代词 — words that stand in someone else's place. We start with the commonest kind.

代词的好处是省事：说过一次“李明”，后面就用“他”。因为“他”替的是名词，所以它能作主语、宾语，也能带“的”作定语（他的书）。代词一共分三类：人称代词、指示代词、疑问代词；后面两课分别讲另外两类。

A pronoun saves work: say 李明 once, then say 他. Because 他 replaces a noun it does noun jobs — subject, object, and with 的 a modifier (他的书). There are three kinds of 代词 in all: personal, demonstrative and interrogative. The next two lessons take the other two.

要记住两件事。第一，“他”“她”“它”读音完全一样，分别只在字形上：说的时候听不出来，写的时候才要选。第二，汉语的代词没有主格宾格：英语的 I 和 me 是两个词，汉语只有一个“我”。北方口语里还有“咱们”，它一定包括听话的人；“我们”可以包括，也可以不包括。

Two things to hold on to. First, 他, 她 and 它 are all tā — the difference exists only on paper, so it is a writing choice, never a speaking one. Second, Chinese pronouns have no subject and object forms: English splits I and me, Chinese has one 我. Northern speech also has 咱们 (口语), which always includes the listener; 我们 may or may not.

“您”用在长辈、老师、客人和不认识的人身上，是尊敬，不是距离。可是它只有单数。要对几个人客气，就说“你们”，正式一点可以说“各位”。

您 goes to elders, teachers, customers and strangers; it signals respect, not distance. But it is singular only. For a polite plural say 你们, or 各位 in a formal setting.

英语有 myself、yourself、himself 一整套，汉语只有一个“自己”，人称由前面那个词决定。“自己”常常表示“不是别人”：他自己做饭，就是没有人帮他。跟“自己”相对的是“别人”——自己以外的人。

English has a whole set — myself, yourself, himself; Chinese has one 自己, and the person comes from the word in front of it. 自己 usually carries the sense 'and nobody else': 他自己做饭 means no one helped him. Its opposite is 别人, everyone who is not 自己.