Watch and read: personal pronouns
In the next steps, you will learn the basics of Frisian grammar. In our view, grammar is a practical tool for structuring the ideas and thoughts you want to express. Grammar is not a goal in itself, but it can be a great help.
You can watch a video with a teacher explaining and reading the examples, and / or you can read the text on this grammatical subject. Choose what feels best for you. In this course, you will only learn about the basic principles and rules.
Personal pronouns
Here you can see an overview of the personal pronouns.
| pronomen | pronoun |
| ik | I |
| do-jo | you |
| hy-sy/se-it | he-she-it |
| wy/we | we |
| jim | you |
| sy/se | they |
Depending on the person you are talking to, we have two forms of the singular ‘you’: do and jo. Jo is used as a polite form to casual acquaintances, strangers, superiors and in general to persons a generation older.
Emphasis
Some pronouns have an emphatic or stressed form, as well as a non-stressed form. For example: sy versus se. Sy is the stressed form, se the non-stressed one.
For example
| Se wennet yn Denemarken. | She lives in Denmark. |
| Sy wennet yn Denemarken. | She lives in Denmark. |
There are two more pronouns with an emphatic or stressed form, as well as a non-stressed form.
sy / se (plural)
| Wêr wenje se? | Where do they live? |
| Wêr wenje sy? | Where do they live? |
wy / we (singular)
| We ha in kat. | We have a cat. (the emphasis is on cat) |
| Wy ha in kat. | We have a cat. (the emphasis is on we) |
Different word order, different pronoun
When the pronoun do (you, informal) follows the verb, they merge into a single word: the pronoun turns into -sto or -st at the end of the verb and becomes part of the verb form. The differences between -sto and -st is that -sto is stressed and -st is non-stressed.
| Do bist Cees. | You are Cees. |
| Wa bisto? | Who are you? |
| Wa bist? | Who are you? |
When hy follows the verb and it doesn’t carry stress, we use er.
| Hy wennet yn Dokkum | He lives in Dokkum. |
| Wêr wennet hy? | Where does he live? |
| Wêr wennet er? | Where does he live? |
| Hy komt mei de bus. | He will get here by bus. |
| Hoe komt hy? | How will he get here? |
| Hoe komt er? | How will he get here? |
Practise with Quizlet
Would you like to practise Frisian grammar? Please visit our grammar section on personal pronouns on Quizlet (you might like to open this in a new window).
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