The Oblique Form for Pronouns: Me, You, Him, Her, It, Us, Them

These next few lessons will be focused on the oblique forms of pronouns, nouns, and adjectives; today we'll focus just on oblique pronouns. We'll get to what the term "oblique" means exactly, but I thought I'd just warn you in advance that the next few lessons may get a bit technical.

In English, when we use a preposition with a pronoun, we use the oblique form of the pronoun. For example, instead of saying, "I gave it to he", we would say, "I gave it to him" -- the oblique pronoun "him" is used instead of the pronoun "he". In Urdu, we do the same thing, except that we use oblique pronouns with postpositions instead of prepositions. Let's take a look at an example. As we've already learned, the Urdu word for "I" is "main". It doesn't make sense to say "from I" though; instead we say "from me":

• mujh se = from me

In the example above, "mujh" is an oblique pronoun. All pronouns have an oblique form, some of which are the same as their direct form (such as "aap" and "tum"). Here's a list of oblique pronouns in Urdu:

• mujh = me
• aap = you (formal)
• tum = you (informal)
• tujh = you (very informal)
• is = him/her/it (near)
• us = him/her/it (far)
• in = them (near)
• un = them (far)

Remember, you should only use the forms above when they're followed by a postposition! Otherwise, use the direct form of the pronoun instead.

So far, we only know of three postpositions in Urdu: "men", "par", and "se". The examples below also use "ko", meaning "to", which we'll cover in more detail in a later lesson.

Examples:

• aap ko = to you (formal)
• tum ko = to you (informal)
• tujh ko = to you (very informal)

• is se = from him/her/it (near)
• us se = from him/her/it (far)

• mujh par = on me
• in par = on them (near)
• un par = on them (far)

Plural Pronouns: we, you, they, these, those

In our last lesson we covered singular pronouns, so today we'll cover plural pronouns. The Urdu word for "we" is "ham" (rhymes with "drum").

• Ham kar rahe hain = We are doing

The Urdu words "aap" and "tum", covered in our previous lesson, can actually also be used in plural cases.

• Singular Case: Tum larki ho = You are a girl
• Plural Case: Tum larkian ho = You are girls
  

The same is true for the words "yeh" and "voh". In addition to meaning "he", "she", or "it", these words can also mean "they" (with "yeh" again referring to people or objects closeby, and "voh" again referring to people or objects that are far away).

• Singular Case: Voh aadmi hai = He (far) is a man
• Plural Case: Voh aadmi hain = They (far) are men
  

The word "lohg", meaning "people", is commonly used to emphasize that a pronoun is referring to multiple people.

• Ham lohg kar rahe hain = We people are doing
• Aap lohg Pakistani hain? = Are you people Pakistani?
• Tum lohg larkian ho = You people are girls
• Voh lohg aadmi hain = Those people are men
  

In summary:

• ham = we
• aap = you (plural, formal)
• tum = you (plural, informal)
• yeh = they/these (near)
• voh = they/those (far)
  

The word "lohg", meaning "people", can be used after any plural personal pronoun to emphasize its plurality.

Singular Pronouns: I, you, he, she, it, this, that

In our first lesson, we'll cover some basic singular pronouns. The Urdu word for "I" is "main" (pronounced with a soft, nasal n).

• Main Canadian hoon = I am Canadian

There are several ways of saying "you" in Urdu. They are: aap, tum, and tu. The word "aap" should be used whenever you intend to show respect (elders, strangers, etc.) The word "tum" is less formal and should be used when you're speaking with a friend, a loved one, or a child. The word "tu" actually is closer to the English word "thou", and is rarely used outside of songs and poetry.

• Aap Pakistani hain? = Are you Pakistani?
• Tum bache ho = You are a child
• Tu kahan hai? = Where are you?

In Urdu, there are no distinct words for "he", "she", and "it". Instead, the words "yeh" and "voh" can be used to refer to all three, but "yeh" refers to people or objects that are nearby and "voh" refers to people or objects that are far away. When referring to an object, "yeh" means "this" and "voh" means "that".

• Yeh meri begam hai = She (near) is my wife
• Voh aadmi hai = He (far) is a man
• Yeh kya hai? = What's this?

In summary:

• main = I
  
• aap = you (formal)
• tum = you (informal)
• tu = you (very informal)
• yeh = he/she/it (near)
• voh = he/she/it (far)