This was a request from Jollysunflora so I’ll go through the pronouns in each language in each language from simplest to most complex *cough* Fire-ese *cough*
Earth-ese
In Earth-ese the pronouns are fairly simple. They don’t change for case and are more or less consistent throughout the whole Earth Kingdom. It’s no wonder United Republic-ans chose these over the Fire-ese pronouns.
Jei – 1st-person pronoun: ‘me’, ‘I’
Su – 2nd-person pronoun: ‘you’
Nope – 3rd-person pronoun (pronounced either 1 syllable or 2 syllables depending on the accent). This refers to a human whose gender is either unspecified, unsure, or neither male or female.
Lu – 3rd-person pronoun, used for a female human: ‘she’, ‘her’
Man – 3rd-person pronoun, used for a male human: ‘he’, ‘him’
Ca – 3rd-person pronoun, used for non-humans like: ‘it’
Now, I have left out ‘we’ and ‘they’ here because this is where Earth-ese differs from English a bit, but it’s still fairly simple.
The word-order of Earth-ese actually allows you to put as many pronouns next to each other as you need. So, instead of ‘we’ you either say ‘me and you’ (jei su) or ‘me and you and her’ (jei su lu) or however pronouns describe what you’re referring to.
‘They’ as in a large group of varied people can be ‘Nope lu man’ or ‘man lu’ but in the Southern dialect it is also common to just add the plural suffix ‘-chong’, such as ‘Nopechong’.
For ‘you’ when referring to a large group, Northern Earth-ese speaker would say ‘Su su’ as in ‘you and you’ but in Southern Earth-ese it is more common to say ‘Suchong’.
There are no formal versions of these pronouns as formality and politeness are often added at the start of the sentence with context words in a similar way to ‘please’. Although, in some Southern dialects they suffix these context words onto the pronouns, similar to the plural marker.
UR Fire-ese
I actually lied. UR Fire-ese probably has the easiest pronouns but since they’re derived from the Earth-ese pronouns I thought it was easier to explain those first.
Anyway, UR Fire-ese took ‘Jei’, ‘Su’, ‘Nope’, ‘Lu’, ‘Man’, and ‘Ca’ from Earth-ese but simplified the plural pronouns using the Fire-ese plural suffix ‘-ghan’ (Pronounced ‘-gan’ in the UR). Fire-ese also has a dual suffix (-zu) but since Earth-ese does not it is only used emphatically in UR Fire-ese.
No-pe-gan – ‘they’, ‘them’ (human)
Cagan – ‘they’, ‘them’ (non-human)
While the ‘-ghan’ suffix can be used on any of the other pronouns, these two were the most commonly accepted in general speech. ‘Sugan’ or ‘Suzu’ or ‘Lugan’ are all understood but only really used when you want to be specific, like specifically saying ‘You all’ or ‘the pair of women’.
However, UR Fire-ese is still Fire-ese and the closer you speak to Mainland Fire-ese the ‘posher’ you are perceived. These pronouns are still vastly preferred but a few very posh/formal speakers add Fire-ese pronouns, usually derived from a person’s title, almost like an honorific.
For example, the Council Page Tarrlok sent to convince Korra to join the taskforce. He would say something along the lines of: “Councilman Tarrlok sends his compliments and urges the Avatar to reconsider his offer.”
Despite being a Fire-ese addition, this is often combined with the Earth-ese articles like ‘the’.
Most people make fun of this practice as it sounds like you’re speaking in third person.
Air-ese don’t conjugate for number, gender, or formality so in effect they only have 3 pronouns:
Fa – 1st-person: ‘me’, ‘I’, we’, ‘us’
Ta – 3rd-person: ‘she’, ‘her’, ‘he’, ‘him’, ‘it’, ‘they’
But everything in Air-ese has to conjugate for case to be understood so these are either used as the ‘f-‘, ‘k-‘, and ‘t-‘ prefixes or the ‘-fa’, ‘-ka’, and ‘-ta’ suffixes.
In a noun phrase, you would add ‘(l)ang’ to them: fang/langfa, kang/langka, tang/langta
If the pronoun refers to the subject of a transitive verb (she kicked him), you add a ‘(h)ik’: fik/hikfa, kik/hikka, tik/hikta
Object of a transitive verb (she kicked him), you add a ‘(t)ag’: fag/tagfa, kag/tagka, tag/tagta
Agent of an intransitive verb (she sleeps), you add a ‘(l)in’: fin/linfa, kin/linka, tin/linta
There are other cases which I’ll list in a later post so with Air-ese it is easiest to learn the individual parts and construct them as you go.
Okay, looking at things now I am starting to see a pattern. Why do I hate ‘we’ and ‘them’ so much? Not a single one of my conlangs ended up having a single word for them.
Oh well. Anyway, Northern Water-ese has 10 pronouns, each of which have a plural form, and each of which have a separate form for the subject of the verb and the object of the verb. That equates to…60 forms total. Thank goodness they’re regular! Once again, you just have to learn the basic building blocks and smash them together.
Inside a verb as an indirect object or something similar, they appear as either the onset or the coda listed in the second column e.g. “Nisok kaguroonga giq!”
The verb here is broken down into: [enjoy-hope-3rd.immaterial-present] -> [ka-guroon-g-a] which the ‘-g-’ referring to the immaterial blog which will make happy.
In Water-ese, instead of a formal/informal distinction like French there is a familiar/unfamiliar distinction. The 2nd-person changes depending on how well you know the person, whether they are a stranger or not. Although, there is a formal 2nd-person used for people with a high status.
The 3rd-person pronouns are split into ‘animate’ pronouns and ‘inanimate’ pronouns. You separate humans and animals into either ‘male’ or ‘female’ while spirits have their own 3rd-person pronoun. Everything else is either ‘solid’ – something with a solid form – ‘flowing’ – something physical but changing – or ‘immaterial’ – something without a physical form. These are often compared to the forms of water: ice, water, and steam.
All of these pronouns are used in the Northern Water Tribe but during the separation caused by the 100 Years War the Southern Water Tribe got rid of the animate 3rd-person pronouns and the 2nd-person formal pronoun. This means that in the Southern Water Tribe all humans and animals are described with the ‘solid’ 3rd-person pronoun. Also, in the Northern Water Tribe they refer to the Avatar using the ‘spirit’ 3rd-person pronoun. In the Southern Water Tribe it’s the same ‘solid’ pronoun as other humans.
There are also pronunciation differences between the Northern Water Tribe and the Southern Water Tribe.
NWT: [Rra -> Ra] [Ves -> Fes] [Kack -> Kak]
SWT: [Min -> Moon] [Ves -> Ve] [Yuk -> Yook] [Miq -> Mik]
So ‘Viq’ would be pronounced ‘Fiq’ in the Northern Water Tribe and ‘Vik’ in the Southern Water Tribe.
Alright, here is the mother of complicated when it comes to pronouns and probably what most of you wanted this post to be about.
There are no regular pronouns in Mainland Fire-ese. Basically, you are constantly speaking in 3rd-person, using things’ names, descriptions, and positions to get across what you are referring to. You can just use people’s names – “Looks like Zuko underestimated the Avatar” – and this is used by children who find remembering pronouns to be difficult but as a result this is often seen as childish or slow-witted.
In an extremely neutral situation, you can use ‘Yudafaw’ or ‘Yukinghan’ to indict yourself who is speaking and the person you are talking to. However, people tend to like to personalise their speech with either their official title, like Fire Lord, or a defining characteristic such as their age, hair, or personality. It is very common to turn adjectives into pronouns like ‘Brown (hair)’, ‘Chatty’, or ‘Blue (clothes)’. These pronouns don’t usually have a specific gender attached to them unless it’s something like ‘mother’, as in the parent who was pregnant, although even this isn’t necessarily female.
These pronouns indicate closeness and formality. For example, most people would refer to the Avatar as ‘Avatar’ (technically ‘Avator’ in the Mainland Fire-ese accent) but once Zuko joins the Gaang and becomes friends with Aang he would instead use ‘Friend’ or just ‘Aang’ in casual conversation.
There is also a good set of demonstratives to refer to inanimate objects:
Uza – Something close to the speaker: ‘this’
Shur – Something close to the listener: ‘this’
(Thing) Lei – Something close to (something): ‘this’
Lian – Something away from the speaker: ‘that’
Mir – Something away from the listener: ‘that’
(Thing) Ehnoz – Something away from (something): ‘that’
‘-zu’ or ‘-ghan’ can be added to any of these to indicate number.
