The word “you,” the second person singular and plural definite pronoun, means “the one or ones being addressed.” Thus, the word “you” needs a) a person to say it and b) a specific person to be addressed directly and ideally hear and/or read it. I suppose all words require a reader and/or listener—like the falling tree in the hypothetical uninhabited forest, a word might not be said to exist in any meaningful sense unless there also exists one who hears (or somehow reads) it. However, “you” might be the only pronoun, definite or indefinite, that needs to be used specifically for direct address—to refer to the person or people receiving the message.
Pronouns are either definite or indefinite. Definite pronouns should have a clear antecedent. In the sentence “The dental hygienist parked his car underneath the tree,” the pronoun “his” should clearly refer to “the dental hygienist.” However, in the sentence “Someone stole his car,” it is unclear who the car thief is, so the indefinite pronoun “someone” is used. Indefinite pronouns like “anyone,” “everyone,” “someone,” etc., however, do not refer to something specific and thus require no antecedent.
In the English language, nouns and pronouns take one of four cases: nominative, objective, possessive, and vocative. Take for example the sentence, “Hey, Nathan, my dietician showed the police the memorabilia she found hidden underneath her cousin’s mattress.” Nominative nouns usually function as the subject of a sentence, or “dentist”; objective nouns function as direct objects, indirect objects, or objects of the preposition, or “memorabilia,” “police,” and “mattress,” respectively; possessive nouns indicate ownership, or “cousin’s”; and vocative nouns identify who or what is being addresses, or “Nathan,” which is set apart from the rest of the sentence by a comma. Save for the addition of an apostrophe “s” (or apostrophe for plural nouns that end with an “s”), nouns appear unchanged despite their case. For example, “iron” and “friend” remain unchanged in “As iron sharpens iron, so a friend sharpens a friend” whether they function as subjects of the sentences or as objects of the verb “sharpens.”
Pronouns, however, are different. The nominative pronouns “I,” “he,” “she,” “we,” and “they” become the objective “me,” “him,” “her,” “us,” and “them” and the possessive “my,” “his,” “her,” “our,” and “their.” Yet there is one exception—save for the possessive form “your,” the second person pronoun “you” remains unchanged despite the case.
Furthermore, the second person pronoun “you” seems to me the only pronoun one could use in a vocative case. I could say, “Hey, you, watch out for that bear!” but I cannot think of a way I could communicate a similar message using a first or third pronoun in a vocative case. I could say, “We should flee the bear!” or “They should flee the bear now!” but in both examples, the pronouns are subjects of the verb phrase “should flee” and thus are subjective, not vocative. In addition to the pronoun “you,” perhaps names, titles, designations, etc. are the only words in the English language that can be used in direct address and thus take the vocative case. In Latin, the vocative is identical to the nominative with a few exceptions. For example, the name “Brutus” becomes “Brute,” hence Julius Caesar’s “Et tu, Brute?” Yet in English, the nominative case and the vocative case seem to be identical for nouns and pronouns—or specifically, one pronoun, the second person “you.”
If I tell my wife about a friend’s troubled marriage, I might say things like, “They’ve been having problems for years now, Lynn—he suggested counseling, but she does not want to go.” None of the pronouns—“they,” “he,” or “she”—refer to the person I’m addressing, Lynn. The people being addressed need not be present for the sentence to be meaningful. I am free to talk with Lynn behind their backs without sacrificing any clarity or accuracy, as far as my use of pronouns goes.
However, seeking Lynn’s input, I might ask her, “Do you think they might get divorced?” This time, the pronouns “you” is the subject but also refers to the person I am addressing. Vera must be present for the sentence to be meaningful, at least in the sense that I am showing that I am interested in her opinion and am asking her a question I hope that she will answer. During my conversation, I could ask, “What do you think, Vice President Joe Biden? Or how about you, Frida Kahlo?” but most likely I will not receive any meaningful response (or any response at all) as those individuals would not be present to hear and respond to my questions. Of course, I could speculate about what they might say, or even ask the questions and state those names aloud—but with any reference to “them,” to only “him” or to “her,” I would be using pronouns that are third person.
When one wants to use the word “you” clearly and accurately, two things should be obvious: a) the person using it and b) the person being addressed. When Uncle Sam first said in 1917, “I want you for U.S. Army,” it should have been clear that he, as artist J.M. Flagg’s personification of the American government, was addressing all able-bodied men who were old enough to serve in the American military during World War I. Thirty years later, when Smokey Bear said, “Only you can prevent forest fires,” again it should be clear that he, as a mascot for the U.S. Forest Service, is addressing a specific group—those who camp or otherwise spend time in America’s forests.
Thus, “you” is a second person definite pronoun that functions as both the subjective and the objective case—and, by definition, as the vocative. Thus, it should only be used to refer to whoever is being addressed in print or in speech. Unfortunately, maybe people erroneously use it at an indefinite pronoun. “You” is a definite, not indefinite, pronoun. It specific antecedent is, by definition, the one being addressed. Misuse of the word “you” makes meaning unclear and inaccurate.
Today J.M. Flagg’s poster is almost one hundred years old, and most of us do not question its meaning. However, one could have argued in 1917 that “I want you for the U.S. Army” was unclear and accurate. What if woman read the poster? Or a child? Or a visitor from another country? Or a very old man? The grammar in Flagg’s poster does not seem to make any exceptions for those individuals whom Uncle Sam most likely did not want for the army. Clearly, the poster was designed to speak to “American men from ages 18 to 35,” but “you” is shorter and thus more effective at reaching a large group of people. A relatively verbose caption, while perhaps clearer and more accurate than the original, probably would not have made Flagg’s work the most popular poster in the world.
However, many writers do misapply the pronoun “you” and erroneously use it to describe a generic group of people—or even themselves. Such incorrect usage lacks in clarity and accuracy.
When I read in “Tricks of the Trade” by Matthew Baldwin, “[W]hen exchanging rings, tell couples to only slide the ring up to the first knuckle and let the other person push it up the rest of the way. Otherwise you run the risk of the groom breaking his bride’s finger in the middle of the ceremony,” I think to myself, “Why would I be running the risk of the groom breaking the bride’s finger here? I’m not marrying anyone.” This passage can be revised to read, “The minister [or ‘The reverend’ or ‘The wedding celebrant’] runs the risk,” which is just as clear and more accurate than the original.
When one of my students writes, “Although my opinion is that watching TV is fun and entertaining, many people have opposing views and think that watching TV is a waste of their time and does not make you smarter,” I think to myself, “Why would many people think that watching TV does not make me smarter? Why would something they do—watching TV—have any effect on me? Do they think it has this effect on other people, too? Or just me?” Again, this passage could be revised to read, “Watching TV does not make people [or ‘viewers’ or ‘its audience’] smarter,” which is clearer and more accurate than the original.
Finally, when another student writes, “When you are enrolled at a community college, you might not be able to pledge a sorority, but you can meet new people and gain new experiences that you would not get anywhere else,” I think to myself, “I graduated from college a long time ago, and I feel pretty secure in my job, so why would I be enrolled at a community college? Furthermore, why would I pledge a sorority? As a male, I don’t think I’d be allowed to do that.” Revising this passage to read, “When a person [or ‘a student’ or ‘a pupil’] is enrolled at a community college” would also be clearer and more accurate.
But what if that last sentence avoided any mention of a sorority and simply stated, “When you are enrolled at a community college, you can meet new people and gain new experiences that you would not get anywhere else”? As I stated above, the first clause could be changed to something like “When a student is enrolled at a community college,” but then what happens to the second half? One possibility is avoid sexist language and revise it: “When a student is enrolled at a community college, he or she can meet new people and gain new experiences that he or she would not get anywhere else.” The “he or she” construction is more unwieldy than “you,” but this is easily remedied by using the plural, so that the sentence reads, “When students are enrolled at a community college, they can meet new people and gain new experiences that they would not get anywhere else.” Furthermore, the part about the pledging can be returned now logically, if both genders are included: “When students are enrolled at a community college, they might not be able to pledge a fraternity or sorority, but they can meet new people and gain new experiences that they would not get anywhere else.” And finally, if the author of this sentence was talking about herself, then she should use the appropriate first person pronoun: ““When I am enrolled at a community college, I might not be able to pledge a sorority, but I can meet new people and gain new experiences that I would not get anywhere else.”
Simply put, there is no use of the generic “you” that is clearer, more accurate, or more specific than the use of the appropriate nouns or pronouns.
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