Overview

This book provides the first comprehensive analysis of the impersonal uses of ‘you’, ‘one’, ‘they’, and ‘people’ in English. The corpus-based study examines shifts in use from the 17th century to today, discusses further impersonalization strategies, such as passives, and compares impersonal ‘you’ with second-person pronouns in other languages. It highlights key innovations such as the rise of simulating ‘you’ – where the addressee is not a member of the group generalized over – and considers language-external as well as language-internal motivations for these changes. Combining synchronic and diachronic perspectives, the book is a valuable resource for scholars in historical linguistics, pragmatics, and syntax.

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9783119148306

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Author Information

Florian Haas, Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, Germany.

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