Demonstrative Adjectives: This, That, These and Those

A demonstrative adjective points at a noun and tells you which one is meant. English has exactly four: this, that, these, those.

They are chosen on two axes at once – how near the thing is, and whether there is one of it or several.

Distance is not only physical. It covers time – this morning means the one we are in, that morning means one already gone – and it covers attitude, which is why that man can sound cold while this man sounds present and immediate.

Adjective or pronoun?

The same four words do two jobs, and the difference is simply whether a noun follows.

• This book is overdue. – adjective, because it modifies book
• This is overdue. – pronoun, because it stands in for the book entirely

Nothing changes in form. If you can delete the word and the sentence loses only its pointing, it was an adjective; if you delete it and lose the subject, it was a pronoun.

The mistake that gets noticed

Never use them as a demonstrative. Them books is a dialect form, widespread in speech and wrong in every kind of formal writing. The standard form is those books.

Two more worth knowing:

This kind and these kinds. The demonstrative has to agree with kind, not with what follows it. This kind of problem is correct; these kind of problems is not, though it is very common. Either write this kind of problem or these kinds of problems.

Vague this. Starting a sentence with a bare This that refers to a whole previous idea leaves the reader guessing. The supplier missed two deliveries and raised prices. This is unacceptable. – what is, the delay, the price, or both? Give the demonstrative a noun to point at: This pattern is unacceptable. That single added word is one of the cheapest clarity improvements in English.

Order with other adjectives

Demonstratives come first in the noun phrase, ahead of every descriptive adjective: those three battered leather suitcases, never battered those three leather suitcases. They belong to the same slot as a, the, my and some, which is why you cannot use two of them together – the this chair is impossible.

For the full picture of how adjectives are classified, see what an adjective is and the eight types.

Practice

Choose the right demonstrative. Answers below.

1. Could you pass me ___ scissors on the far table?
2. ___ kind of delay costs us customers.
3. I have never trusted ___ two suppliers.
4. ___ morning has been a disaster, and it is only ten o’clock.
5. Put ___ boxes down before you drop them.

Answers

Checked against Merriam-Webster, the Chicago Manual of Style and the AP Stylebook. Spotted an error? Tell us — see our editorial policy.