What Are Intensive (Emphatic) Pronouns? (with Examples)
The intensive pronouns (also called emphatic pronouns) are myself, yourself, herself, himself, itself, ourselves, yourselves, and themselves.
These words can be either intensive pronouns or reflexive pronouns.
Intensive Pronouns
An intensive pronoun is paired with another noun or pronoun (shown in bold) to emphasise it.
The intensive pronouns are:
myself, yourself, herself, himself, itself, ourselves, yourselves, and themselves.
- The Queen herself attended the party.
(The Queen is the noun being emphasised. The Queen is the antecedent of herself.)
- Nothing is impossible for the man who doesn’t have to do it himself. (“Weiler’s Law”)
- Learn from others’ mistakes. You won’t live long enough to make them all yourself. (Anon)
This page is about their use as intensive pronouns.
Using Intensive Pronouns
An intensive pronoun refers back to another noun (or pronoun) in the sentence to emphasise it. For example:
- The mayor himself attended the ceremony.
(The mayor is the noun being intensified. It is called the antecedent of the intensive pronoun.)
When used for emphasis, a word like himself is called an intensive pronoun (which is also known as an emphatic pronoun).
Examples of Intensive Pronouns
Here are some examples of intensive pronouns:
- She will do it herself.
- (The intensive pronoun herself emphasises that she will do it. Her husband won’t do it. Her son won’t do it. SHE will do it.)
- The boys baked these scones themselves.
- (The intensive pronoun themselves emphasises that the boys baked the scones, i.e., not their mothers.)
- I heard the lie myself.
- (The intensive pronoun myself emphasises that I heard the lie.)
Note: It’s not always about people:
- The dog opened the cupboard itself. ✔︎
You can test if it’s an intensive pronoun by removing it and seeing if you get the same effect by emphasising the thing you’re trying to emphasise with your voice (shown here in uppercase).
- SHE will do it.
- I heard the lie.
- THE DOG opened the cupboard.
Why Should I Care about Intensive Pronouns?
Using an intensive pronoun is far slicker than bolding a word, WRITING IT IN UPPERCASE LETTERS, or underlining it. Yuk! When speaking, you can emphasise a word with your voice, so there’s an alternative to using an emphatic pronoun. In writing, however, the alternatives are often unwieldy or ambiguous.
An intensive pronoun just provides emphasis, but that’s a pretty important job. It’s often the reason the sentence exists.
- She will attend the reception drinks herself.
Note that an intensive pronoun can be removed from a sentence without affecting the sentence’s core meaning.
AGH / Jan 2020