yourself

See also: Yourself

English

Alternative forms

Etymology

From Middle English yourself, equivalent to your +‎ -self.

Pronunciation

  • (Received Pronunciation, strong) IPA(key): /jɔːˈsɛlf/, /jʊəˈsɛlf/
  • (Received Pronunciation, weak) IPA(key): /jəˈsɛlf/
    • Audio (London):(file)
  • (General American, strong) IPA(key): /jɔɹˈsɛlf/, /jʊɹˈsɛlf/
  • (General American, weak) IPA(key): /jɚˈsɛlf/
    • Audio (US):(file)
  • Hyphenation: your‧self
  • Rhymes: -ɛlf

Pronoun

yourself (referring to the person being spoken to, previously mentioned, the reflexive case of you)

  1. (reflexive pronoun) Your own self (singular).
    Be careful with that fire or you'll burn yourself.
    After a good night's sleep you'll feel like yourself again.
  2. (emphatic pronoun) You (singular); used emphatically, especially to indicate exclusiveness of the referent's participation in the predicate, i.e., that no one else is involved.
    You yourself know that what you wrote was wrong.
  3. (especially Ireland; proscribed) You (singular); even when "you" has not been used previously; see usage notes.
    I spoke with yourself last in February.
    No one understands me like yourself.
    My colleague and yourself are invited to the conference.
    I only spoke to my lawyer and yourself about the issue.

Usage notes

Use of "yourself" as in "I spoke with yourself last in February." is an untriggered reflexive (i.e. "yourself" is used to mean "you" without the pronoun "you" being used previously in the sentence), which is proscribed.

Derived terms

Translations

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

See also

English personal pronouns

Dialectal and obsolete or archaic forms are in italics.

personal pronoun possessive
pronoun
possessive
determiner
subjective objective reflexive
first
person
singular I
me (colloquial)
me myself
me
mysen
mine my
mine (before vowels, archaic)
me
plural we us ourselves
ourself
oursen
ours
ourn (obsolete outside dialects)
our
second
person
singular standard
(historically
formal)
you you yourself
yoursen
yours
yourn (obsolete outside dialects)
your
archaic
(historically
informal)
thou thee thyself
theeself
thysen
thine thy
thine (before vowels)
plural standard you
ye (archaic)
you yourselves yours
yourn (obsolete outside dialects)
your
colloquial you all
y'all
you guys
you all
y'all
you guys
y'allselves all yours
y'all's
you guys'
your guys'
all your
y'all's
your all's (nonstandard)
you guys'
your guys'
informal /
dialectal
(see list of dialectal forms at you and inflected forms in those entries)
third
person
singular masculine he him himself
hisself (archaic)
hissen
his
hisn (obsolete outside dialects)
his
feminine she her herself
hersen
hers
hern (obsolete outside dialects)
her
neuter it
hit
it
hit
itself
hitself
its
his (archaic)
its
his (archaic)
hits
genderless1 they them themself, themselves theirs their
nonspecific
(formal)
one one oneself one's
plural they them
hem, 'em
themselves
theirsen
theirs
theirn (obsolete outside dialects)
their

1 See Appendix:English third-person singular pronouns for attested neopronouns.

Middle English

Alternative forms

  • youreself, yourselff

Etymology

your +‎ self

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /ˈjuːrsɛlf/

Pronoun

yourself

  1. Emphatic plural 2nd person pron.

Descendants

  • English: yourself
  • Yola: yerzel

References