Mini Pronouns 👶

Mini-pronouns are shrunken forms of pronouns that are used to shorten parts of a phrase. They're like little babies and so they need to go in the kids' section 👶.

Mini (Enlitic) Pronoun Chart

NOTE: The 1st/2nd person plural pronoun مو - mU is often pronounced as "am" in spoken Pashto.

Where they're used

For Pashto learners, it can be confusing to see these little pronouns peppered in sentences. They can seem ambiguous and confusing, as if they could mean anything. Thankfully Pashto gives us another very simple rule to know what mini-pronouns can be used for. Mini pronouns are only used to "shrink" 🪄 or replace two things:

1. The servant of a VP
2. A possesive

1. As a shrunken servant

The "servant" NP in a VP can be "shrunken" 🪄 and replaced with a mini-pronoun.

Examples with non-past transitive verbs

With non-past transitive verbs, the object is the servant . Have a look at this present tense phrase.

We can shrink the servant NP تا - taa (you) into a mini-pronoun and then put it in the kids' section.

Whatever the servant NP is, the whole block is shrunken and replaced by a mini pronoun. For example we can have a really long NP like ستا د مور خوندوره ډوډۍ - staa du mor khwundawara DoDuy (your mother's tasty food). Have a look at the blocks that make up this phrase by clicking on the , then see what happens when you click on the Mini below to shrink the servant.

Examples with past-tense transitive verbs

With past-tense transitive verbs, the servant is the subject. See what happens when you shrink the servant with this of VP. (Click Mini below)

2. As a shrunken possesive

You can also take possesives and shrink them into mini-pronouns. The possesive can be found in any part of a phrase. To shrink it you just take it out and replace it with a mini-prounoun, which goes in the kids' section. Here's a phrase with the possesive د هغې - du haghé (her).

So that can be shrunk down to the mini-pronoun یې - ye which goes in the kids

Sometimes possesives will be found in the middle of sandwiches. When we shrink them down into a mini-pronoun they always pop out and go into the kids' section. Take a look at the blocks in this phrase (click ).

While exploring/editing phrases, you can click on the 🪄 above a possesor to shrink it. Try clicking the on the following phrase and shrinking the possesive by clicking on the 🪄.

When we talked about NPs we also noted that you use possesives to add subject or objects to participles. These can be shrunken in the same way. Try editing this phrase and shrinking the subj/obj of the participle.

More about these kids 👶

Mini-pronouns run off on their own

Wherever the mini-pronouns came from, they always run off to the kids' section! Especially with possesive pronouns, learners may feel like they need to stay attached to the word they were connected to. This is not true at all. Once we have a a mini-pronoun, in always goes it the kids' section, wherever that may be. It does not stay attached to the area it came from. Sometimes the kids section will happen to be next to the word a possesive came from.

Here it's just a coincedence that the دې - de (your) falls next to the پلار - plaar (father). But the kids' section could be far, far away, depending on what's in the phrase. For example

Watch what happens when we shrink د هغوي - du haghwee (their) into یې - ye

The یې - ye sits in the kids section, wayyy at the other end of the sentence. Now what if we shrink the possesive ستا - staa (your) into another mini-pronoun.

Now we have two mini-pronouns in the kids' section! Which brings us to an really interesting and important rule.

With multiple mini-pronouns 👶 👶

It's possible to have up to 2 mini-pronouns in the kids section as long as they're not the same (no twins!)

When mini-pronouns go in the kids' section, they always line up in order of 1st, 2nd, 3rd person.

In our example above about their brother sitting in your house the 2nd person sing. pronoun دې - de came before the 3rd person pronoun یې - ye. The kids will always follow this pecking order.

Let's see how this works with a very common example. Pashtuns often say "I'm happy that I heard your voice".

Here we can shrink two things:

• the servant ما - maa shrinks to مې - me
• the possesive ستا - staa shrinks to دې - de

Both of these go into the kids section and line up in order of 1st, 2nd, 3rd... so we line them up as مې دې - me de

Now let's take a different phrase:

We can shrink two things in this phrase:

• the servant تا - taa shrinks to دې - de
• the possesive زما - zmaa shrinks to مې - me

Once we line these up in order in the kids' section we get مې دې - me de, the exact same thing as above!

So when we see a sentence like غږ مې دې واورېد - ghuG me de waawred this can mean either "I heard your voice", or "you heard my voice" 🤯

Try clicking the and shrinking down the servants and possesives in these two phrases below.

Both turn out to be the exact same thing. So if someone says, ماشوم مې یې وواهه - maashoom me ye óowaahu, that can mean either, "She hit my child" or "I hit her child!"

Remember our example about about their brother sitting in your house yesterday? There could be a second meaning to this sentence, can you work it out?

Once something becomes a mini-pronoun, it floats over into the kids' section and lines up in order there, so there's no telling where it came from other than from context. You can see there can be a bit of ambiguity when using mini-pronouns. They are used extremely frequently, but in places when it's obvious who/what you're referencing.