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Why are reflexive pronouns not used in the following examples? The sentences numbered 1 are what people say, but the sentences numbered 2 are what I understand should be be used, as the subjects of the sentences are doing some actions on themselves. Examples from the Oxford dictionary:

  1. I forgot to take my bag with me when I got off the bus.

  2. I forgot to take my bag with myself when I got off the bus.

and

  1. Please don't forget to take your passport with you.

  2. Please don't forget to take your passport with yourself.

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Mehrdad
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    Please use full words in your question. I almost thought you were asking about the Sith. – curiousdannii Aug 21 '14 at 08:33
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    Advice from the linguists at 'British Council' (!): Warning But we use personal pronouns, not reflexives, after prepositions of place...

    He had a suitcase beside him.

    and after with when it means "accompanied by":

    She had a few friends with her. // Of course, this just generalises the rule (-of-thumb?); it doesn't explain it.

     – Edwin Ashworth Aug 21 '14 at 09:16
  • One quick observation: the direct objects in your examples are not the same as the subjects. The DO in #1 is bag, and in #2, passport. If they were doing the action to themselves, the examples would be #1: I forgot myself and #2 Don't [you - implied] forget yourself. – anongoodnurse Aug 21 '14 at 11:37
  • @EdwinAshworth with the noteable exception of a particular idiom: "beside [x]sel(f/ves) with [emotion]", e.g. "beside himself with rage". – Matt E. Эллен Aug 21 '14 at 12:23
  • @Edwin: it's not just the preposition. Consider "she had a large beach towel wrapped around her" but "she wrapped a large beach towel around herself". – Peter Shor Aug 21 '14 at 12:35
  • @Matt That usage is metaphorical rather than spatial (locative / directional). 'Came to himself', 'kept it to himself', 'took a lot upon himself' ... behave similarly. – Edwin Ashworth Aug 21 '14 at 13:18
  • @Peter You've got the British Council banged to rights. It's no wonder learners have difficulty with 'when and how to use a preposition / reflexive pronoun / ...' – Edwin Ashworth Aug 21 '14 at 13:19
  • Lederer has the odd 200 pages on the subject here. – Edwin Ashworth Aug 21 '14 at 14:06
  • @Edwin: I have always assumed that the reflexive pronoun was used when it wasn't clear that the two pronouns referred to the same person (and in fact, I gave this answer for a similar question), but in she had a large beach towel wrapped around her, "she" and "her" could easily be two different people. So now I'm baffled. – Peter Shor Aug 21 '14 at 14:47
  • The rule is that all rules are pseudorules. (Of course, there's a lot of truth in the disambiguation rule-of-thumb you give. But in the article I link to, there are quite a few examples where the choice between personal pronoun or reflexive seems pretty free, despite the fact that ambiguities can in some cases arise with the choice of personal.) – Edwin Ashworth Aug 21 '14 at 17:17
  • @EdwinAshworth linguists at the British Council might be a teeny bit of a far fetched notion (I say this as an EFL teacher whose friends write stuff for the British Council ...) :) – Araucaria - Him Aug 21 '14 at 17:48
  • @Araucaria Apologies. 'Friends of EFL teacher/s, who write stuff for the British Council ...'. Joking aside, I don't know how to attribute correctly in cases like the one in the above link. – Edwin Ashworth Aug 21 '14 at 17:55
  • @PeterShor It's worse than that even: Jane showed Maria a picture of herself. The reflexive could easily refer to either too! – Araucaria - Him Aug 21 '14 at 19:17
  • @PeterShor, Edwin, There are a lot of situations where the use of a reflexive is optional. These aren't arbitrary situations though. Such situations are detailed in CaGEL 2002. There are also instances where you can get 'override'. These are marked uses of either reflexives or normal pronouns where we would expect the other form. These normally achieve some sort of extra effect by being used this way. The cases where both can be used in the non-marked usages mostly have clear (but not simple) circumstances (can't find right word). see CaGEL pp 1483-1499 for proper info. – Araucaria - Him Aug 21 '14 at 19:25
  • @EdwinAshworth Yes, point taken absolutely. And I was being a bit tongue in cheek too. On the flip side of your BC observation though, we never really know the 'whys', we just have persuasive theories that fit the patterns ( -until they're disproved ...) – Araucaria - Him Aug 21 '14 at 19:30
  • @Araucaria Their 'It remains unclear what factors determine whether the reflexive is mandatory or merely optional' (p 1492) doesn't seem to correspond to your 'These aren't arbitrary situations though'. – Edwin Ashworth Aug 21 '14 at 22:31

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