# jego, jej, ich etc. - possessive adjectives or genitive pronouns?



## zorba111

can you help settle a debate we're having on Duolingo...

We're discussing a phrase "jego ryba" = "his fish".

I'm saying that literally this means "the fish of him" and jego is the genitive form of 3PS masc. PRONOUN not a POSSESSIVE ADJECTIVE

The usage here is different from the possessive adjectives: "moja, twoje, nasz, wasze" etc.

If "jego" were a true possessive surely it would decline by gender, like those in the line above?

It doesn't: "jego pies, jego kobieta i jego dziecko w domu"

Also by case, But it doesn't:

Kocha jego kobietę. Nie kocham jego kobiety

Which leads me to believe its the genitive form of the pronoun... literally "of him".

Thanks!


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## Gochna

Wow, I've never noticed that! You're right that it doesn't decline, but I would somehow still qualify it as a possessive adjective (beats me why though)...

On a side note, if you say: *Kocha jego kobietę*, it means that he love someone else's woman - just as *Je jego kanapkę* would mean that he eats another man's sandwich. If it's "*his woman*" (feminist belonging concept aside) and *his sandwich*, it would be: *Kocha swoją kobietę*, *Je swoją kanapkę*.


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## marco_2

According to prof. Moszyński, even in Proto-Slavic language possessive pronouns / adjectives didn't exist in the 3rd person both singular and plural and so-called possessive genitive was used instead. That's why in Polish we say: *Poszukaj go / jej / ich *(Look for him / her / them) and *Poszukaj jego / jej / ich psa. *(Look for his / her / their dog). So in Polish genitive forms of personal pronouns for the third person sound the same as possessive adjectives, although e.g. in Bulgarian they differ: the Bulgarians say _него / нея / тях _for personal pronouns and _негов / неин / техен _for possessive pronouns respectively.


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## jasio

zorba111 said:


> I'm saying that literally this means "the fish of him" and jego is the genitive form of 3PS masc. PRONOUN not a POSSESSIVE ADJECTIVE


Formally it's possessive pronoun - it's classified this way even if it differs from possessive pronouns of other grammatical persons.



zorba111 said:


> Which leads me to believe its the genitive form of the pronoun... literally "of him".


Genitive of 3rd person personal pronouns both plural and singular (long form, if they have long and short forms) are identical to possessive pronouns:



> *Jego* tu nie ma. *Jego* samochód jest zepsuty.
> *Jej* tu nie ma. *Jej* samochód jest zepsuty.
> *Ich* tu nie ma. *Ich* samochód jest zepsuty.


Unlike 1st and 2nd persons:


> *Mnie* tu nie ma. *Mój* samochód jest zepsuty.
> *Ciebie* tu nie ma. *Twój* samochód jest zepsuty.
> *Nas* tu nie ma. *Nasz* samochód jest zepsuty.
> 
> *Was* tu nie ma. *Wasz* samochód jest zepsuty.


So it might have indeed originated as a Genitive case of Personal Pronouns (Genitive often includes a Possessive function both in Polish, and in other languages... please refer to a Saxon Genitive in English), but nowadays its classified as Possessive Pronoun.


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## zorba111

Hi Gochna, thanks for the input!

I am now content to treat tego and jej as possessive adjectives.

What I wondering is why then bother with the genitive pronouns, it seemed a duplication. But now I've remembered that they're used for all the other things that the genitive case is used for OUTSIDE OF possession (e.g. negating a transitive verb, prepositions etc.)

I had seen something about those possessives (swoją etc.) but now I really see them in action and understand them.

Thanks.


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## zorba111

Thanks to the 2x OPs also. Underlining the same points.

I only saw your messages after already replying to Gochna, sorry!

Seems that in the distant past the two aspects of grammar were one, before the other uses of genitive pronouns arose perhaps...


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## bibax

jasio said:


> So it might have indeed originated as a Genitive case of Personal Pronouns (Genitive often includes a Possessive function both in Polish, and in other languages... please refer to a Saxon Genitive in English), but nowadays its classified as Possessive Pronoun.


In fact, the 3rd pers. possessive *jego *(jej, ich) is the genitive case of the personal pronoun *on *(...).

Compare:

Vonnegut stworzył postać Kilgore Trouta, pisarza science fiction, którego literacki świat uważa za obraz *jego samego*. = ... za *jego* (Vonneguta) obraz.

and

Czy jest to prawdziwy obraz *mnie samego*? = ... *mój* prawdziwy obraz?

_Jego/mnie_ (in connection with _samego_) is obviously genitive of _on/ja.
_
Without the word _samego_ we must use _mój_ instead of _mnie_, but _jego_ is invariable (the same for _jej_ and_ ich_).


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## Ben Jamin

The fine (and bad at the same time) about grammar is that the same linguistic phenomenon can be described in many different ways. "Jego" is structurally a personal pronoun but functionally a possessive adjective. Grammarians quarrel often about such problems, but both definitions are correct, and it is only a convention that has established one of them as "correct".


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## zorba111

Dziękuję za odpowiedź 
(practicing a new phrase 

or perhaps more correctly:
Dziękuję za odpowiedźe (plural)


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## Karton Realista

zorba1 said:


> Dziękuję za odpowiedźe (plural)


Odpowiedzi!
And writing soft consonant + vowel is a cardinal mistake in Polish. If it was odpowiedzie <---, it would be written like that.


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