science

Intensive pronoun

Intensive pronoun is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Intensive pronoun rather than just read about it. In short: An intensive pronoun (or self-intensifier) adds emphasis to a statement; for example, "I did it myself." While English intensive pronouns (e.g., myself, yourself, himself, herself, ourselves, yourselves, themselves) use the same form as reflexive pronouns, an intensive pronoun is different from a reflexive pronoun because it functions as an adverbial or adnominal modifier, not as an argument of a verb. Both intensiv…

Key takeaways

Intensive pronoun belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Intensive pronoun to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Intensive pronoun from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

An intensive pronoun (or self-intensifier) adds emphasis to a statement; for example, "I did it myself." While English intensive pronouns (e.g., myself, yourself, himself, herself, ourselves, yourselves, themselves) use the same form as reflexive pronouns, an intensive pronoun is different from a reflexive pronoun because it functions as an adverbial or adnominal modifier, not as an argument of a verb. Both intensive and reflexive pronouns make reference to an antecedent. For example, compare "I will do it myself," where "myself" is a self-intensifier indicating that nobody else did it, to "I sold myself," where "myself" fills the argument role of direct object. This sentence may be extended, as in "I sold myself myself," where the second pronoun emphasizes the fact that nobody helped me to sell myself.

Terminology Self-intensifiers have also been called simply "intensifiers", or "emphatic reflexives", or "intensive reflexives". In many languages, they are similar or identical to reflexive pronouns.

In other languages Latin has a dedicated intensifier, ipse, -a, -um, used to emphasize a noun or pronoun in either a subject or a predicate of a sentence. In Danish, emphasis is indicated using the word selv; "I will do it myself" is rendered Jeg gør det selv. When a verb is used that requires reflexion, it becomes similar to English except that two words are used: "I help myself" is rendered Jeg hjælper mig selv. In German, emphasis is indicated using the word selbst. "I will do it myself" is rendered Ich werde es selbst tun. Dutch usage of zelf is identical: Ik zal het zelf doen. In Spanish, as in most other pro-drop languages, emphasis can be added simply by explicitly using the omissible pronoun. Following the above example, "I will do it myself" is rendered "Lo haré yo." Adding "mismo" after the pronoun yields additional emphasis. French uses a form of the disjunctive pronoun that is followed by the adverb -même (e.g. Je l'ai fait moi-même.). There are intensive forms of personal pronouns in Udmurt language, Komi language, and Tatar language, e.g., "[you] ourselves": Udmurt: 'асьтэос', Komi: 'асьныд', Tatar: 'үзегез'. In Russian language the intensifiers are 'sam' (masculine myself, masculine yourself, himself) / sama (feminine myself, feminine yourself, herself) / sami (*selves) and unlike English they differ from the reflexive modifier 'sebya', applicable to all pronouns. Intensifier pronouns may be used to intensify the 'base' pronoun: "ona sama vidit" ("She-herself-sees), as well as by themselves: "sama vidit" (herself-sees), because in Russian the base pronoun may be omitted, because it may be inferred from the declension of the verb. The same is with the Belarusian language.

See also Disjunctive pronoun Weak pronoun Intensifier

References

Further reading Ramsey, Samuel (1968). The English Language and English Grammar. Ardent Media. p. 324. Discusses how English came to acquire reflexive and intensive pronouns from earlier languages. Gast, Volker & Peter Siemund. 2006. Rethinking the relationship between SELF-intensifiers and reflexives. Linguistics 44(2). 343–381. doi:10.1515/LING.2006.013.

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Intensive pronoun

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Intensive pronoun claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Intensive pronoun before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Intensive pronoun ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Intensive pronoun

In research: Intensive pronoun appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Intensive pronoun in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Intensive pronoun is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Grammar stubs, Personal pronouns, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Intensive pronoun outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Intensive pronoun in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Intensive pronoun means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Intensive pronoun out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Intensive pronoun in simple terms?

Why does Intensive pronoun matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Intensive pronoun?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Intensive pronoun.