An indefinite pronoun is a pronoun that refers to non-specific beings, objects, or places. Indefinite pronouns can represent either count nouns or noncount nouns. They often have related forms across these categories: universal, assertive existential, elective existential, and negative. Assertive existential pronouns differ from elective existential pronouns in that they either themselves assert or are used in contexts that assert that the group to which the pronoun refers has at least one member. In contrast, the elective existential pronouns do not assert such membership and are used in contexts where membership is uncertain, and may be determined, or elected, at a later point in the discourse. Electives are also used when a question of existence is being explicitly denied, which gives rise to their frequent use in negative clauses. In many contexts, assertive and elective existential pronouns are largely in partial complementary distribution or free variation, but there are contexts where they contrast and the difference in their meanings can be demonstrated clearly:
Bill’s lawyer failed to do anything that could have helped him.
Bill’s lawyer failed to do something that could have helped him.
The latter implies that there was a specific thing that the lawyer failed to do which could have helped Bill. On the other hand, the former makes no presupposition on if there was anything the lawyer could have done differently, only that he ultimately did not help Bill. Indefinite pronouns are associated with indefinite determiners of a similar form. A pronoun can be thought of as replacing a noun phrase, while a determinerintroduces a noun phrase and precedes any adjectives that modify the noun. Thus all is an indefinite determiner in "all good boys deserve favour" but a pronoun in "all are happy".
Many of these words can function as other parts of speech too, depending on context. For example, in many disagree with his viewsthe word "many" functions as an indefinite pronoun, while in many people disagree with his views it functions as a quantifier that qualifies the noun "people". Example sentences in which the word functions as an indefinite pronoun are given. Most indefinite pronouns are either singular or plural. However, some of them can be singular in one context and plural in another. The most common indefinite pronouns are listed below, with examples, as singular, plural or singular/plural. A singular pronoun takes a singular verb. Also, any personal pronoun should also agree :
Some of the English indefinite pronouns above have possessive forms. These are made as for nouns, by adding 's or just an apostrophe following a plural -s. The most commonly encountered possessive forms of the above pronouns are:
one's, as in "One should mind one's own business."
those derived from the singular indefinite pronouns ending in -one or -body: nobody's, someone's, etc.
whoever's, as in "We used whoever's phone that is."
those derived from other and its variants: the other's, another's, and the plural others': "We should not take others' possessions."
either's, neither's
Most of these forms are identical to a form representing the pronoun plus-'s as a contraction of is or has. Hence someone's may also mean someone is or someone has, as well as serving as a possessive.
Compound indefinite pronouns
Two indefinite pronouns can sometimes be used in combination together. And they can also be made possessive by adding an apostrophe and s.
