In linguistics, a pro-form is a type of function word or expression that stands in for (expresses the same content as) another word, phrase, clause or sentence where the meaning is recoverable from the context.[1] They are used either to avoid repetitive expressions or in quantification (limiting the variables of a proposition).
Pro-forms are divided into several categories, according to which part of speech they substitute:
An interrogative pro-form is a pro-form that denotes the (unknown) item in question and may itself fall into any of the above categories.
The rules governing allowable syntactic relations between certain pro-forms (notably personal and reflexive/reciprocal pronouns) and their antecedents have been studied in what is called binding theory.
Some 19th-century grammars of Latin, such as Raphael Kühner's 1844 grammar,[3] organized non-personal pronouns (interrogative, demonstrative, indefinite/quantifier, relative) in a table of "correlative" pronouns due to their similarities in morphological derivation and their syntactic relationships (as correlative pairs) in that language. Later that century, L. L. Zamenhof, the inventor of Esperanto, made use of the concept to systematically create the pro-forms and determiners of Esperanto in a regular table of correlatives. The table of correlatives for English follows.
| + Table of correlatives | ||||||||||
| interrogative | demonstrative | quantifier | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| proximal | medial | distal | assertive existential | elective/dubitative existential | universal | negatory | positive alternative | |||
| determiner | which what | this (sg.) these (pl.) | that (sg.) those (pl.) | yon yonder | some | any whichever whichsoever | every each all | no | another | |
| pronoun | human | who whom (obj.) | this (one) (sg.) these (ones) (pl.) | that (one) (sg.) those (ones) (pl.) | yon yonder | someone somebody | anyone anybody whoever whomever (obj.) whosoever whomsoever (obj.) | everyone everybody all | no one nobody | another someone else somebody else |
| nonhuman | what | this (one) (sg.) these (ones) (pl.) | that (one) (sg.) those (ones) (pl.) | yon yonder | something | anything whatever whatsoever | everything all | nothing | something else else other | |
| out of two (dual) | which | this one (sg.) these (ones) (pl.) | that one (sg.) those (ones) (pl.) | yon yonder | one | either whichever whichsoever | both | neither | other | |
| out of many (plural) | some (pl.) one (sg.) | any whichever whichsoever | each all | none | another | |||||
| pro-adverb | location | where | here | there | yonder | somewhere | anywhere wherever wheresoever | everywhere | nowhere | elsewhere |
| source | whence | hence | thence | somewhence | anywhence whencever whencesoever | everywhence | nowhence | elsewhence | ||
| goal | whither | hither | thither | somewhither | anywhither whitherever whithersoever | everywhither | nowhither | elsewhither | ||
| time | when | now | then | sometime somewhen | anytime anywhen whenever whensoever | ever always everywhen | never nowhen | elsewhen another time | ||
| manner | how whereby | thus hereby | thereby | somehow | anyhow however howsoever | everyway everywise | no waynowise | otherwiseelsewise | ||
| reason | why wherefore | herefore | therefore | somewhyfor some reason | whyever whysoever | |||||
Some languages may have more categories. See demonstrative.
Note that some categories are regular and some are not. They may be regular or irregular also depending on languages. The following chart shows comparison between English, French (irregular) and Japanese (regular):
| interrogative | quantifier | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| existential | negative | |||
| human | who qui dare | someone quelqu'un dareka | no one (neg. +) personne daremo + neg. | |
| nonhuman | what que nani | something quelque chose nanika | nothing rien nanimo + neg. | |
| location | where où doko | somewhere quelque part dokoka | nowhere nulle part dokomo + neg. | |
(Note that "daremo", "nanimo" and "dokomo" are universal quantifiers with positive verbs.)
Some languages do not distinguish interrogative and indefinite pro-forms. In Mandarin, "Shéi yǒu wèntí?" means either "Who has a question?" or "Does anyone have a question?", depending on context.