THEMSELVES


Meaning of THEMSELVES in English

Frequency: The word is one of the 700 most common words in English.

Note: 'Themselves' is the third person plural reflexive pronoun.

1.

You use ~ to refer to people, animals, or things when the object of a verb or preposition refers to the same people or things as the subject of the verb.

They all seemed to be enjoying ~...

The men talked amongst ~...

PRON: v PRON, prep PRON

2.

You use ~ to emphasize the people or things that you are referring to. Themselves is also sometimes used instead of ‘them’ as the object of a verb or preposition.

Many mentally ill people are ~ unhappy about the idea of community care...

PRON emphasis

3.

You use ~ instead of ‘himself or herself’ to refer back to the person who is the subject of sentence without saying whether it is a man or a woman. Some people think this use is incorrect.

What can a patient with emphysema do to help ~?...

PRON: v PRON, prep PRON

4.

You use ~ instead of ‘himself or herself’ to emphasize the person you are referring to without saying whether it is a man or a woman. Themselves is also sometimes used as the object of a verb or preposition. Some people think this use is incorrect.

Each student makes only one item ~...

PRON emphasis

Collins COBUILD.      Толковый словарь английского языка для изучающих язык Коллинз COBUILD (международная база данных языков Бирмингемского университета) .