The photo is of my parents and I at a backyard wedding.
Does that sentence sound wrong? If you’re not sure, how about this one:
My in-laws joined my wife, our children and I for a big holiday dinner.
They are both wrong. In these sentences, me should have been used for I.
Correct: The photo is of my parents and me at a backyard wedding.
Correct: My in-laws joined my wife, our children and me for a big holiday dinner.
Are you confused?
Don’t feel badly. Grammar confuses a lot of people, especially I/me. The use of the I or me pronoun when you are referring to yourself depends on whether the pronoun is the subject or the object in the sentence
Subject and Object
- A subject is the person or thing doing the action in the sentence.
- The object is the thing that is receiving the action.
Here are two correct examples:
Jason and I ran to the park.
Jason and you are the subjects in this sentence because both are doing the action (running). The park is the object. Therefore the pronoun for the subject in this sentence is I.Jason ran into me.
Jason is the subject doing the action in the sentence, but now you are the object. Therefore the pronoun for the object is me.
ME is always the correct pronoun for the OBJECT in the sentence. You would not say Jason ran into I . It’s wrong, and hopefully it sounds wrong!
When there’s more of you
People often get confused about what pronoun to use when they’re talking about themselves and a few others. What if you were with a couple of friends, say, Rasheed and Nicole, when Jason ran into the three of you? The same rule about pronouns would apply because all three are objects in the sentence.
The correct sentence is: Jason ran into Rasheed, Nicole and me.
Here’s a trick:
This may help you determine whether to use I or me: Drop the rest of the names in the sentence to see how it sounds.
Example 1 (from the beginning of this post): Drop the parents from the sentence:
The photo is of I at a backyard wedding. Hopefully that sounds wrong. The photo is the subject, and the photo is of a group of people (including you) who are all objects in the sentence. Therefore the correct sentence is: The photo is of my parents and me at a backyard wedding.
Same with the 2nd example. Drop the wife and kids so it reads: My in-laws joined I for a big holiday dinner. Hopefully that also sounds wrong.
Here’s a test:
Fill in the blank with me or I. If you aren’t sure, drop the other name(s) associated with the pronoun in question from the sentence.
- The thank you gift is from Michael and ____.
- Michael and ____ want to thank you with this gift.
- Kay and Phil had dinner with Ian, Richard and _____.
- Ian, Richard and ____ had dinner with Kay and Phil.
- No one knows the trouble you put Dad and ____ through.
- You put Dad and ____ through a lot of trouble.
- Dad and ____ forgive you for the trouble you put us through.
Answers:
- me
- I
- me
- I
- me
- me
- I
I hope this helps you understand what is a common grammar mistake!
Thank you for visiting!
Linda K. Sienkiewicz is a writer, poet, and artist.
Learn more about her multi-award winning novel, In the Context of Love.
Learn more about her picture book, Gordy and the Ghost Crab.
Learn more about her poetry chapbook, Sleepwalker
Buy Linda’s books: In the Context of Love | Gordy and the Ghost Crab | Sleepwalker
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This drives me around the bend, too. And you’re right, the old grade-school trick of taking the others out of the sentence never fails.
As for the newspaper columnist, I agree he should know better. But I also bet that his newspaper has cut most of its copy editor jobs, as so many papers have. A good copy editor is such a gift to writers and I’m sorry to see so many have lost their jobs.
It’s good to know I’m not the only one bugged by this. You’re right, Lisa, about the copy editors, something that hadn’t occurred to me. Okay. I’m a little more forgiving about the columnist’s error now.
Just a little.
Me am mortified.
Ms. Romeo is right about the dwindling number of copy editors, and the high price paid by careful readers and careless columnists.
But that’s no excuse. The buck stops with, um, me.
Too funny!! I’m laughing!
I had considered emailing you about it, but I thought that would be really annoying. I enjoy your column, particularly the one with the above-mentioned goof, about the merging of holiday traditions in your mixed family (http://bit.ly/edUlkk if anyone is interested). It was perfect for Christmas morning.
Thanks for stopping by, Brian!
Thank you. I have always known using I as an object was wrong, but so many people do it that I assumed I was wrong. Now I will stick up for myself and use the right grammar even if it isn’t popular. Again, thank you for the right on clarification.
You’re welcome, Debra! Yes, stick up for your right to be right, although, I have to warn you, when you get into the use of prepositions vs transitions, it can get a little sticky! See Grammar Girl’s discussion of “than I” vs “than me” at http://bit.ly/48h4m. It will make your head spin!
I am pleased to find other people who find this error annoying. Schools are fighting an up hill battle, though, when TV and movie characters who are educated make this mistake. Example: on House MD, Stacy, the lawyer, said, “Me and Mark are just fine.”
Ouch! It grates your ears, doesn’t it! The intention may be to make the dialogue sound informal, as if “Mark and I” would make the character seem snooty. To my ears, “Me and Mark” makes the character sound uneducated.
I recently read this Facebook status, “I just ordered a part for John and I’s phone.” The I was not only incorrectly used but morphed into some horrible possessive monstrosity.
It seems people are overcorrecting with I more and more. I am hearing it in television and movies with alarming frequency. I am glad to see that I am not the only one bothered by this. In fact, I would much rather hear someone undercorrect and use me in the subject than to hear I used in prepositional phrases. At least overusing me just sounds like informal language whereas overusing I seems like someone is trying to sound smart and failing.
Ouch! That status update is SO wrong!
I get really annoyed by this also – it is one of my “pet hates”. I have had many arguments with friends about this, and my husband gets annoyed with me when I try to talk to people about it (he couldn’t care less whether he gets it right or not – he uses “I” all the time when he should not), One friend I argued with went off to consult a school teacher who told him I was wrong !! I just told him that my Mum was a school teacher in the 1920’s and they learnt correct grammer in those days !!
Spouses can be frustrating. Get him a good grammar book for Christmas.
I am another one bothered by the incorrect use of I and me. To Libby Telfer, you say your mum was a teacher in the 1920s and “learnt” correct grammar – too bad you didn’t learn from her that the word is “learned.”
Thanks for that jady412 – I guess you are right. However, I believe it is debatable. I do not profess to be an expert on grammar – I am sure my mother did her best though !!!
Libby and Jady,
Learnt is a variant of the past tense of learn. It is correct, just not as common. An example of a similar past tense variant is dreamt and dreamed. Both are correct.
Ok….so I was teaching subject pronoun and object pronoun to my nephew. I wanted him to change the object into an object pronoun so I wrote, ‘Sarah is going shopping with _________ ( Mark and I)’ I wanted him to change it to ‘us’. But after I looked at my example I became unsure. Should I have used (Mark and me or me and Mark) since ‘I’ is a subject pronoun and ‘me’ is an object pronoun?
Sarah is shopping with Mark and “me.” Just as Sarah goes shopping with “me,” if Mark couldn’t go! She certainly wouldn’t shop with “I” …. that’d be weird.
Me and I are the same as We and Us. “We” is the subject (We are shopping with Sarah) and “us” is the object (Sarah is shopping with us)
Good for you for taking the time to teach grammar to your nephew!
Hi Linda,
I had a question about a particular sentence and stumbled upon your site. What if I had to write a sentence that displayed the age gap between siblings. Should it be “There’s a huge age gap between me and my sister.” or should it be “There’s a huge age gap between my sister and me.” or should it be “There’s a huge age gap between my sister and I.”
It certainly sounds like a stupid question but sometimes I get stuck with the silliest of sentences and this is no exception. I’d appreciate it if you could let me know. Thanks!
“There’s a huge gap between my sister and me” is correct. In this sentence, the gap is the subject and the sisters are the objects.
Remember, if you’re not sure, make the sentence just about you and repeat it to yourself, and you’ll probably know which is correct: “There’s a huge gap between I” sounds wrong because it is wrong.
I hope that helps!
I’m confused which one to use in this one particular sentence:
is it-
You’re as crazy as me or you’re as crazy as I?
And could you please give me an explanation to this. thankyou.
🙂
First of all, I apologize for taking so long to respond to your question!
What you’re actually saying is “You are as crazy as I am crazy.” Therefore, when you’re speaking this, it would be “You’re as crazy as I.”
However, in this case, using the correct pronoun sounds stilted, especially in a casual setting. If you want to be grammatically correct, you’re probably better off to say “You’re as crazy as I am.”
On another note, (in your original text) isn’t it “Don’t feel bad”, not “Don’t feel badly”. This is another one of those problematic ones, I think. I’ve been mulling this one over for years. To feel badly, I think means that one is doing a bad job of feeling. The other indicates that one feels awful (bad) about something.