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Now, I'm writing something quite important and confused whether don't can be used instead of doesn't in my sentence. I know that English natives usually treat that me as the third-person-singular pronouns, for example:

  1. It's me who is so generous that's bought you such a gift.

And if we use I in this case (which is also acceptable), then we treat it as the very pronoun I:

  1. It's I who am feeding your hamster now.

2.2. It's I who usually eat all the pizza.

But can I treat that me as the pronoun I, for example:

  1. Is it me who don't understand you?!

3.2. It's not me who am mending your roof up there.

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    "I" is a subject pronoun. "Me" is an object pronoun. All of your examples should use "It is I who... " because the speaker is making themselves the subject of the sentence. Just drop the "It is" and "who" to test the pronoun/verb tense: "I am feeding your hamster..." (subject) or "Your hamster is fed by me..." (object) –– a native speaker might use 'me' incorrectly as subject while speaking, probably because they are speaking faster than they are thinking... but this 'mistake' is a comedy trope of an uneducated person trying to sound pretentious/educated while missing the rules. – wetcircuit Feb 04 '23 at 13:19

3 Answers3

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So just as a native speaker of British English those last two sentences should be:

Is it me who doesn't understand you?!

It's not me who is mending your roof up there.

However to be honest none of the example sentences sound very natural. I'd rephrase them as:

I'm the one who's so generous to buy you such a gift.

I'm feeding your hamster now.

I usually eat all the pizza.

Saying 'It's I who' instead of just 'I' makes it sound like your deliberately being overly dramatic. Although for the full effect you'd want to say 'It is I who'.

I think this is because by using 'It's I who' you're talking about yourself in the third person, albeit using I instead of your name. Bare in mind this is me being a native speaker instead of someone who knows the technical ins and outs of the language, so using 'I' means you may not technically be using the third person but your certainly close.

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Native American speaker here.

Sorry, these all sound unnatural to my ear.

It's me who is so generous that's bought you such a gift.

American: The construction sounds like the gift receiver has mistakenly thanked the wrong person for the gift, and the speaker is jealous of that attention. Hence,

"It was me that was so generous to buy you this gift!"

Now,

"It's I who am feeding your hamster now."

Again, sounds foreign, and like a case of mistaken identity. If you insist on using "I", I would say:

"It is I. I am feeding your hamster now."

I would never say "It is I who is...", I will always say "I am...".

"It's I who usually eat all the pizza."

Again, never "It is I", unless that is the complete sentence. So for example where that would work,

Commander: "Who is second in charge here?"

Harry: "It is I." (but more likely Harry would say, "I am.", as in "I am second in charge here.")

So, I'd write:

"I usually eat all the pizza."

Now,

But can I treat that me as the pronoun I, for example:

No. It is more like the pronoun "her" or "him".

For "Is it me who don't understand you?!"

I'd write

Is it me that doesn't understand you?!

You cannot write "me who do not", it is "me who does not". And even then, Americans will say "me that".

Which applies to the next one as well.

It's not me who am mending your roof up there.

I would say

It's not me that is mending your roof up there.

Amadeus
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Okay, so as stated in the comments, "Me" is the first person singular objective pronoun, not third person. The third person objective pronouns are "Him, Her, It."

"Don't" and "Doesn't" are contractions for "Do Not" and "Does Not". Does is the third person conjugation of the verb "To Do" and should only follow a Sentance with a third person Subjective which are "He/She/It" in the singular and "They" in the plural.

hszmv
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