Advanced Pronouns in Hawaiian

In Brief

Hawaiian pronouns identify both person and number: one person, exactly two people, or a larger group. For “we,” they also show whether the listener is included: kāua is “you and I,” māua is “we two, not you,” kākou includes the listener, and mākou excludes the listener. A pronoun used as an object commonly follows iā, as in iaʻu “me” and iā lākou “them.”

Overview

A pronoun is a word that stands in for a person or group, such as “I,” “you,” or “they.” At B1, the central challenge is no longer just remembering au, ʻoe, and ʻo ia. You need to choose forms that tell the listener exactly how many people are involved and, with first-person groups, whether “you” belongs to the group.

English leaves much of this information unstated. “We are going” might mean “you and I,” “my sister and I, but not you,” or a whole group that may or may not include the person listening. Hawaiian normally makes that distinction in the pronoun itself. It also has a dual number (a form specifically for exactly two), alongside singular and plural.

This system matters in ordinary conversation. Choosing kākou can invite the listener into an activity or shared identity; choosing mākou places the speaker inside a group but outside the listener’s group. The same pronouns can serve as subjects, while object phrases generally use the personal marker iā. Reflexive expressions—where the action points back to the same person—add iho, as in iā ia iho “himself/herself.”

How It Works

Person, number, and inclusion

Person means the speaker’s relationship to the conversation: first person includes the speaker, second person addresses the listener, and third person refers to someone else. Number tells whether the pronoun refers to one, exactly two, or more than two.

Person	Singular	Dual: exactly two	Plural: three or more
First person, inclusive	—	kāua — you and I	kākou — we, including you
First person, exclusive	au / wau — I	māua — I and one other, not you	mākou — we, not you
Second person	ʻoe — you	ʻolua — you two	ʻoukou — you all
Third person	ʻo ia — he, she, it	lāua — those two	lākou — they, three or more

“Inclusive” means that the person being addressed belongs to “we.” “Exclusive” means that the speaker belongs to the group but the person being addressed does not. These labels apply only to first-person dual and plural forms.

The difference between dual and plural is exact. ʻOlua addresses two people; ʻoukou addresses a group of at least three. Likewise, lāua refers to two, while lākou refers to three or more. In casual English, “you both” or “the two of them” may provide the closest translation, but Hawaiian does not need an extra word for “both.”

Choosing among the four forms of “we”

Ask two questions:

1. Is the listener included? If yes, choose a k- form; if no, choose an m- form.
2. How large is the group? If exactly two, choose the dual form ending in -ua; if three or more, choose the plural form ending in -ākou.

Intended group	Hawaiian	Natural English meaning
Speaker + listener	kāua	you and I / we two
Speaker + one other, not listener	māua	the two of us, not you
Speaker + listener + at least one other	kākou	all of us, including you
Speaker + at least two others, not listener	mākou	we, but not you

This is a grammatical distinction, not merely optional emphasis. When English says “we,” pause and picture the group before choosing the Hawaiian form.

Pronouns as subjects

The subject is the person or group that performs the action or is being described. In a verbal sentence, Hawaiian commonly places the verb phrase before the subject:

tense/aspect marker + verb + subject

• Ua hele māua. — We two went (not you).
• Ke hana nei ʻoukou. — You all are working now.
• E hoʻi ana lākou. — They will be returning.

Do not automatically add ʻo before every subject pronoun. The familiar third-person singular form appears as ʻo ia, but the other forms occur directly in ordinary verbal subject position: Ua hele au, Ua hele kāua, Ua hele lākou.

Both au and wau mean “I.” Their distribution depends on the sentence pattern and style, so learn each complete expression as you meet it rather than replacing one mechanically with the other. In many basic verbal sentences after the predicate, au is the familiar form: Hele au “I go.”

Pronouns as objects with iā

An object is the person or thing affected by an action. Hawaiian generally marks personal names and personal pronouns used as objects with iā. Before most pronouns, it is written as a separate word; with the first-person singular, the conventional written form is iaʻu.

Meaning	Object phrase	Example gloss
me	iaʻu	to me / me
you (one)	iā ʻoe	to you / you
him, her	iā ia	to him/her / him/her
us two, including you	iā kāua	to us two / us two
us two, excluding you	iā māua	to us two, not you
you two	iā ʻolua	to you two
those two	iā lāua	to those two / them both
us, including you	iā kākou	to all of us, including you
us, excluding you	iā mākou	to us, not you
you all	iā ʻoukou	to you all
them	iā lākou	to them

English uses different forms such as “I/me” and “we/us.” Hawaiian usually keeps the same pronoun and lets iā signal its role: mākou as a subject, iā mākou as an object. Notice the important spelling contrast ʻo ia “he/she” versus iā ia “him/her” after an object-marking iā.

The particle can mark the direct object (the person directly affected) or the recipient after verbs of giving and speaking. The English translation may therefore use no preposition, “to,” or another natural phrasing:

• Ua ʻike ʻo ia iaʻu. — He/She saw me.
• Ua hāʻawi ʻo ia i ka lei iā ʻoe. — He/She gave the lei to you.
• Ua ʻōlelo ke kumu iā lākou. — The teacher spoke to them.

Reflexive expressions with iho

A reflexive expression points the action back to the same participant: “I saw myself” or “she spoke to herself.” Hawaiian can place iho after the relevant pronoun phrase:

• Ua nānā ʻo ia iā ia iho. — He/She looked at himself/herself.
• Ua ʻike au iaʻu iho. — I saw myself.
• E mālama ʻoukou iā ʻoukou iho. — Take care of yourselves.

The context tells you whether iā ia iho means “himself,” “herself,” or sometimes “itself”; Hawaiian third-person pronouns do not encode grammatical gender. Also remember that iho has directional uses such as “downward.” Its reflexive reading comes from the whole construction, not from treating every occurrence of iho as “self.”

Examples in Context

Hawaiian	English	Note
E hele kāua i ke kahakai.	Let’s go to the beach, you and I.	Dual inclusive
Ua kuke māua i ka ʻaina ahiahi.	The two of us cooked dinner, not including you.	Dual exclusive
Ke aʻo nei ʻolua i ka ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi.	You two are learning Hawaiian.	Second-person dual
Ua hoʻi mai lāua i ka hale.	The two of them returned home.	Third-person dual
E hīmeni kākou.	Let’s all sing.	Plural inclusive; invites the listener
Noho mākou ma Hilo.	We live in Hilo.	Plural exclusive
E heluhelu ʻoukou i kēia puke.	You all should read this book.	Second-person plural
Ua hiki mai lākou i nehinei.	They arrived yesterday.	Third-person plural
Ua ʻike ʻo ia iaʻu.	He/She saw me.	iaʻu is the first-person object form
Ua aloha au iā ʻoe.	I love you.	Singular personal object
Ua nānā ʻo ia iā lākou.	He/She looked at them.	Third-person plural object
Ua hāʻawi ke kumu i nā puke iā ʻolua.	The teacher gave the books to you two.	Dual recipient
E kōkua mai ʻoe iā mākou.	Please help us, not including yourself.	Plural exclusive object
Ua nānā ʻo ia iā ia iho ma ke aniani.	He/She looked at himself/herself in the mirror.	Reflexive third person
E mālama kākou iā kākou iho.	Let us all take care of ourselves.	Inclusive group is subject and reflexive object

The English translations sometimes need added phrases such as “not including you.” Those words are not separate additions in Hawaiian; the information is built into māua or mākou.

Common Mistakes

Using one Hawaiian form for every English “we”

• Wrong: E hele mākou! when inviting the listener to join the group
• Right: E hele kākou!
• Why: Mākou excludes the listener. An invitation to a group that includes the person addressed calls for kākou; for only “you and I,” use kāua.

Ignoring the dual

• Wrong: Ua hoʻi lākou for exactly two previously mentioned people
• Right: Ua hoʻi lāua.
• Why: Hawaiian distinguishes two from three or more. Use lāua for exactly two and lākou for a larger group.

Dropping iā before a personal object

• Wrong: Ua ʻike au ʻo ia.
• Right: Ua ʻike au iā ia.
• Why: ʻO ia is the familiar subject form “he/she.” After a verb such as ʻike, the personal object is iā ia “him/her.”

Writing the first-person object as iā au

• Wrong: Ua kōkua ʻo ia iā au.
• Right: Ua kōkua ʻo ia iaʻu.
• Why: The conventional first-person singular object form is the fused form iaʻu. Learn it as a whole.

Adding ʻo before every subject pronoun

• Wrong: Ua hele ʻo lākou.
• Right: Ua hele lākou.
• Why: Do not generalize the shape of ʻo ia to the whole paradigm. In an ordinary verbal sentence, use au, ʻoe, kāua, lākou, and the other pronouns directly after the predicate.

Forgetting to repeat the pronoun in a reflexive object

• Wrong: Ua nānā ʻo ia iā iho.
• Right: Ua nānā ʻo ia iā ia iho.
• Why: In this pattern, iho follows the pronoun that identifies who the reflexive expression refers to.

Usage Notes

Inclusive and exclusive pronouns carry real conversational meaning. E hoʻomaka kākou presents the action as shared by speaker and listeners: “Let’s all begin.” E hoʻomaka mākou reports what the speaker’s own group will do and explicitly leaves the listeners outside that “we.” Neither form is inherently warmer or colder; the correct choice depends on who actually belongs to the group.

English “you” is equally underspecified. Hawaiian ʻoe, ʻolua, and ʻoukou make audience size visible. This is useful in instructions: a teacher addressing two students can say ʻolua, while instructions to the whole class use ʻoukou. Hawaiian pronouns do not make the English gender distinction “he” versus “she”: ʻo ia covers both, and lāua/lākou do not distinguish “they” by gender.

Written Hawaiian requires careful attention to the ʻokina and kahakō. Forms such as ʻoe, ʻolua, ʻoukou, kāua, and māua should not be treated as optional spelling variants without those marks. They represent features of pronunciation and can help distinguish words and forms.

With nonhuman objects, learners will often see i rather than iā: compare Ua ʻike au i ka hale “I saw the house” with Ua ʻike au iā Keola “I saw Keola.” Actual usage is shaped by meaning and construction, so the useful learner rule is to associate personal pronouns and personal names strongly with iā, not to label every possible referent by a rigid English “animate/inanimate” test.

Beyond the Basics / Advanced Use

Pronouns interact with emphasis and equational patterns (sentences that identify one thing as another). A pronoun can be brought into a prominent ʻo phrase, as in ʻO wau ke kumu “I am the teacher” or ʻO mākou nō “It is indeed us.” This does not contradict the rule that ordinary post-verbal subjects normally appear without a newly added ʻo. The sentence pattern has changed: the pronoun is now in a focused or identifying phrase.

Reflexive and emphatic meanings can overlap. Depending on its position and construction, a pronoun followed by iho may be understood as “self/selves” or “personally”: ʻo ia iho can emphasize “he/she personally” or “that very person,” while iā ia iho after a verb can mark the action’s reflexive target. Translate the relationship expressed by the complete sentence rather than assigning iho one fixed English equivalent.

The same full pronoun inventory also appears inside possessive and other prepositional systems, but those systems may change the form surrounding the pronoun and may introduce the Hawaiian A-class/O-class possessive distinction. Do not assume that knowing mākou automatically tells you every way to say “our.” First master the person, number, and inclusion contrasts here; then learn possessive forms as their own structured paradigm.

Finally, translations can conceal a shift in group membership. In a story, one English “we” may need to alternate between māua, mākou, kāua, and kākou as different people enter the conversation. Skilled reading means tracking the speaker, listener, and group at every turn rather than translating each form simply as “we.”

Practice Tips

1. Draw the group before choosing the word. Put “speaker” and “listener” in circles, add any other people, then select kāua, māua, kākou, or mākou. This makes inclusion visible instead of relying on an English translation.
2. Drill in pairs: subject first, object second. Say lākou — iā lākou, ʻolua — iā ʻolua, mākou — iā mākou. Then build two short sentences, such as Ua hele lākou and Ua ʻike au iā lākou.
3. Retell a short event with changing viewpoints. Describe what “you and I,” “my friend and I,” and “all of us” did. Check both the exact number and whether your imagined listener is included each time.

Related Concepts

• Prerequisite: Personal Pronouns — introduces the core subject pronouns and the first inclusive/exclusive contrast.
• Supporting concept: Object Markers (i/iā) — explains how Hawaiian marks objects, including people and names.
• Next step: Advanced Possessives — extends person and number distinctions into possessive constructions.