you

English Online Dictionary. What means you‎? What does you mean?

English

Etymology 1

From Middle English you, yow, ȝow (object case of ye), from Old English ēow (“you”, dative case of ġē), from Proto-West Germanic *iwwi (“you”, dative case of *jiʀ), from Proto-Germanic *iwwiz (“you”, dative case of *jīz), the Western form of Proto-Germanic *izwiz (“you”, dative case of *jūz), from Proto-Indo-European *yúHs (“you”, plural).

Cognate with Scots you (“you”), Saterland Frisian jou (“you”), West Frisian jo (“you”), Low German jo, joe and oe (“you”), Dutch jou and u (“you”), German euch (“you”), Middle High German eu, iu (“you”, object pronoun), Latin vōs (“you”), Avestan 𐬬𐬋 (vō, “you”), Ashkun yë̃ (“you”), Kamkata-viri šo (“you”), Sanskrit यूयम् (yūyám, “you”).

See usage notes. Ye, you and your are cognate with Dutch jij/je, jou, jouw; Low German ji, jo/ju, jug and German ihr, euch and euer respectively. Ye is also cognate with Danish I and archaic Swedish I.

Alternative forms

• ye (archaic nominative, dialectal plural)
• ya, yah, yer, yeh, y', yo, yu, yuh (eye dialect or informal)
• yoo (eye dialect)
• yew (eye dialect or obsolete)
• -cha (informal, after /t/)
• -ja (informal, after /d/)
• u (Internet, informal)
• yuo (Internet, ironic)
• youe, yow, yowe (obsolete)

Pronunciation

• (stressed)
• (MLE) IPA^(key): /jy/
  • (Received Pronunciation) enPR: yo͞o, IPA^(key): /juː/
  • (General American) enPR: yo͞o, IPA^(key): /ju/
  • (Canada) IPA^(key): [jʉː], [jɪu̯]
  • (General Australian) enPR: yo͞o, IPA^(key): /jʉː/
  • (Scotland, Northern Ireland) IPA^(key): /jʉ/
  • Rhymes: -uː
• (unstressed)
• (MLE) IPA^(key): /jə/
  • (Received Pronunciation) enPR: yo͞o, IPA^(key): /ju/
  • (General American, General Australian) enPR: yə, IPA^(key): /jə/
• Homophones: ewe, u, yew, yu; hew, hue, Hugh (h-dropping)

When a word ending in /t/, /d/, /s/, or /z/ is followed by you, these may coalesce with the /j/, resulting in /tʃ/, /dʒ/, /ʃ/ and /ʒ/, respectively. This is occasionally represented in writing, e.g. gotcha (from got you) or whatcha doin'? (more formally what are you doing?).

Pronoun

you (second person, singular or plural, nominative or objective, possessive determiner your, possessive pronoun yours, singular reflexive yourself, plural reflexive yourselves)

1. (object pronoun) The people spoken, or written to, as an object. [from 9th c.]
2. (reflexive pronoun, now US colloquial) (To) yourselves, (to) yourself. [from 9th c.]
3. (object pronoun) The person spoken to or written to, as an object. (Replacing thee; originally as a mark of respect.) [from 13th c.]
4. (subject pronoun) The people spoken to or written to, as a subject. (Replacing ye.) [from 14th c.]

   You are all supposed to do as I tell you.

   • 2016, VOA Learning English (public domain)

     Are you excited? ― Yes, I am excited!

5. (subject pronoun) The person spoken to or written to, as a subject. (Originally as a mark of respect.) [from 15th c.]
6. (object pronoun, colloquial) A person's favorite sports team.

8. (indefinite personal pronoun) Anyone, one; an unspecified individual or group of individuals (as subject or object). [from 16th c.]
10. (indefinite personal pronoun) A dummy pronoun used in certain constructions, usually with verbs of receiving (such as get or find) or sensing (such as see or hear), typically stating the existence or typicality of something.

Usage notes

• Originally, you was specifically plural (indicating multiple people), and specifically the object form (serving as the object of a verb or preposition; like us as opposed to we). The subject pronoun was ye, and the corresponding singular pronouns were thee and thou, respectively. In some forms of (older) English, you and ye doubled as polite singular forms, e.g. used in addressing superiors, with thee and thou being the non-polite singular forms. In the 1600s, some writers objected to the use of "singular you" (compare objections to the singular they), but in modern (non-dialect) English thee and thou are archaic and all but nonexistent and you is used for both the singular and the plural.
• Several forms of English now distinguish singular you from various marked plural forms, such as you guys, y'all, you-uns, or youse, though not all of these are completely equivalent or considered Standard English.
• The pronoun you is usually, but not always, omitted in imperative sentences. In affirmatives, it may be included before the verb (You go right ahead; You stay out of it); in negative imperatives, it may be included either before the don't, or (more commonly) after it (Don't you dare go in there; Don't you start now).
• The pronoun you is also used in an indefinite sense: the generic you.
• See Appendix:English parts of speech for other personal pronouns.

Synonyms

• (subject pronoun: person spoken/written to):

  yer (UK eye dialect)

  plus the alternative forms listed above and at Appendix:English personal pronouns

• (subject pronoun: persons spoken/written to; plural): See Thesaurus:y'all
• (object pronoun: person spoken/written to): thee (singular, archaic), ye, to you, to thee, to ye
• (object pronoun: persons spoken/written to): ye, to you, to ye, to you all
• (one): one, people, they, them

Derived terms

Descendants

• Belizean Creole: yu
• Bislama: yu
• Cameroon Pidgin: you
• Jamaican Creole: yuh
• Nigerian Pidgin: yu
• Sranan Tongo: yu
• Tok Pisin: yu
• Torres Strait Creole: yu

Translations

See also

Determiner

you

1. The individual or group spoken or written to.

2. Used before epithets, describing the person being addressed, for emphasis.

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

you (third-person singular simple present yous, present participle youing, simple past and past participle youed)

2. (transitive) To address (a person) using the pronoun you (in the past, especially to use you rather than thou, when you was considered more formal).

Translations

Etymology 2

Noun

you (plural yous)

1. The name of the Latin-script letter U/u.

Alternative forms

• u

Derived terms

• doubleyou

References

Cameroon Pidgin

Alternative forms

• yu

Etymology

From English you.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ju/

Pronoun

you

1. thou, thee, 2nd person singular subject and object personal pronoun

See also

Japanese

Romanization

you

1. Rōmaji transcription of よう

See also

• yō (yō)

Karawa

Noun

you

1. water

References

• transnewguinea.org, citing D. C. Laycock, Languages of the Lumi Subdistrict (West Sepik District), New Guinea (1968), Oceanic Linguistics, 7 (1): 36-66

Leonese

Etymology

Inherited from Late Latin eo, from Classical Latin egō̆.

Pronoun

you

1. I

See also

Mandarin

Romanization

you (you⁵ / you⁰, Zhuyin ˙ㄧㄡ)

1. Hanyu Pinyin reading of 喲 / 哟

Romanization

you

1. Nonstandard spelling of yōu.
2. Nonstandard spelling of yóu.
3. Nonstandard spelling of yǒu.
4. Nonstandard spelling of yòu.

Usage notes

• Transcriptions of Mandarin into the Latin script often do not distinguish between the critical tonal differences employed in the Mandarin language, using words such as this one without indication of tone.

Middle English

Etymology 1

Pronoun

you

1. Alternative form of yow

Etymology 2

Pronoun

you

1. (chiefly Northern and East Midland dialectal) Alternative form of þou

Mirandese

Etymology

Inherited from Late Latin eo, from Classical Latin egō̆.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /jow/

Pronoun

you

1. I (the first-person singular pronoun)

Paraujano

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈjou̯/
• Rhymes: -ou̯
• Syllabification: you

Verb

you 0 (stative)

1. to be big
2. to be old

Derived terms

References

• Álvarez, José, Bravo, María (2008) “you”, in Diccionario básico de la lengua añú [Basic dictionary of the Añú language]‎^[1], Maracaibo, Venezuela: University of Zulia, →ISBN, page 108.

Pouye

Noun

you

1. water

References

• transnewguinea.org, citing D. C. Laycock, Languages of the Lumi Subdistrict (West Sepik District), New Guinea (1968), Oceanic Linguistics, 7 (1): 36-66

Takia

Etymology

Borrowed from Bargam yuw and Waskia yu.

Noun

you

1. water

References

• Malcolm Ross, Andrew Pawley, Meredith Osmond, The Lexicon of Proto-Oceanic: The Culture and Environment (2007, →ISBN

Terebu

Noun

you

1. fire

Further reading

• Malcolm Ross, Proto Oceanic and the Austronesian Languages of Western Melanesia, Pacific Linguistics, series C-98 (1988)