long personal pronouns

[hector_von_kyiv]

In what other languages there are long personal pronouns (more that 1-2 syllables), like "wata(ku)shi" in Japanese or "жасасын" in Kazakh?

Comments

[narcissus1]

Malay: mereka (them)

[light_over_me]

Korean maybe? I haven't studied it, but I think they have politeness levels and use honorifics and titles similar to Japanese...?

[muckefuck]

For Korean, it's harder to make the argument that pronouns are an open class than it is for Japanese. There's no basic pronoun that's longer than two syllables. (I wouldn't count an example like second-person plural 너희들 /nehuytul/ because the pluralising particle 들 /tul/ needn't appear; the element 희 /huy/ already expresses collectivity.)

[graeco_celt]

Catalan: nosaltres (we/us) and vosaltres (plural you)

[andalusia_]

The Malay language contains a few long personal pronouns used in formal/very polite settings, such saudara (2nd person, male), saudari (2nd person, female), beliau (3rd person singular, neutral). There's also kalian (2nd person plural) which is considered formal in Malay but is considered informal in Bahasa Indonesia. (Just a note: the standard forms of both languages are seen to be mutually intelligible.)

[naatz]

Hebrew, "anoXI" {x=kh}. Very archaic/formal "I", but there. Old Aramaic is 'anaku' {I think}.

Hebrew, for present tense {which is the participle}, "hineNI" can be used for "I", "hiNEna" for "she", and "hiNEhu" for "he". Again, archaic and formal.

both the "anoxi" and the "hine[]" pronouns are used in cultural references, thoguh.

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