The influence of the sociolinguistic environment on the evolution of pronouns

Abstract

The article analyzes the problem of the second person singular pronoun in modern English. The absence of a second person singular pronoun in modern English is always the focus of attention for students of this language. The article discusses the reasons why the nominative case form and the objective form are the same for second person pronouns. The influence of historical events that took place in the political and social life of England on the second person pronoun is noted. As a result of these political and social events, the reasons of the complete withdrawal of the ancient second person singular pronoun in English from the communication, from the official and spoken language as a whole, are studied. As a result of socio-political events that took place in the English social environment, the reasons for the loss of the second person pronoun are explained. They say that this pronoun appears only in artistic language, poetry, and church texts. This article examines the fact that personal pronouns acquire different semantic connotations when addressing the ruling class and subjects, people subordinate to the ruling class, peasants and convicts. At the same time, the paradigm of the second person pronoun and its use in the simple present tense is determined.