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Which is correct?

"I made lunch for my wife and I"
-or-
"I made lunch for my wife and myself"

--I hear both of them used.

Hellion
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Shlomo Green
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    for my wife and me. preposition + indirect object. – Lambie Nov 28 '16 at 17:41
  • Do not say 'myself' when what you really mean is 'me'. It is a habit that has grown, ironically, particularly among more educated people. Other people can never talk to myself, only to me. See this article on reflexive pronouns if you're struggling to differentiate between them. – BladorthinTheGrey Nov 28 '16 at 17:48
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    You use the reflexive pronoun (myself, himself, etc.) when the actor is also the target. Here, the actor (the person performing the action of making lunch) is also the target (the person for whom lunch is being made), so the reflexive pronoun is correct. (see, for example, English Club's page on reflexive pronouns.) – Hellion Nov 28 '16 at 17:53
  • @Hellion Agreed. You don't say "I made lunch for me," or "he made lunch for him." You say "I made lunch for myself," and "he made lunch for himself." – Mick Nov 28 '16 at 18:04
  • I made lunch for myself and my wife. I made lunch for my wife and me. I made lunch for me and my wife. NOT: for I. – Lambie Nov 28 '16 at 18:11
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    The non-reflexive "me" (not "I") is fine since the subject "I" is its only possible antecedent. The reflexive form "myself" would thus be optional here. – BillJ Nov 28 '16 at 18:33
  • I'm surprised that "me / myself / I" isn't a common duplicate with a pre-existing question that could be linked to. – JeremyDouglass Nov 29 '16 at 00:47

2 Answers2

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Basing my answer on ESL-teacher and native-speaker intuition here, but I think both are wrong.

The reflexive pronoun is seldom (read: never) used if there are more subject pronouns than just the subject.

So in this example, I don't see why you wouldn't just use:

"I made lunch for my wife and me."

You should use "me" here because it's "for whom".

Michael AM
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  1. "I made lunch for my wife and I."

Incorrect because you're putting a subject pronoun in the object position. (This is a common mistake made by many native speakers of English.)

  1. "I made lunch for my wife and myself."

Correct. It will be easier to see why it needs to be reflexive if we omit the other person: "I made lunch for myself."

Here is an example of a sentence with the plain, non-reflexive pronoun "me":

  1. "My wife made lunch for my mother and me."
aparente001
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  • You have committed a rookie mistake. You have tried to regularise the grammar according to what you think would be logical. Coordinations of pronouns don't follow the same rules in terms of agreement as single ones. – Araucaria - Him Nov 29 '16 at 15:08
  • @Araucaria - Calling me a rookie doesn't convince me. Would you mind posting an Answer? I am interested to understand your point of view. – aparente001 Nov 29 '16 at 15:21
  • I wasn't calling you a rookie, was just saying that that's a rookie mistake :) See the venerable F.E.'s answer here. It includes info from vetted grammar sources such as the Cambridge Grammar of the English Language. – Araucaria - Him Nov 29 '16 at 15:35
  • @Araucaria - If you want to quote F.E.'s answer in a post here, it would be helpful to signal which part of that treatise would be relevant to whether to use the reflexive pronoun or not. Similarly, if you want to quote from the Cambridge Grammar, it would be helpful to signal which part is relevant to this particular question. – aparente001 Nov 29 '16 at 15:41
  • The part of your answer which is problematic is the bit where you say "Incorrect because you're putting a subject pronoun in the object position. (This is a common mistake made by many native speakers of English.)". <--as shown in F.E.'s quote from CamGEL, this description is not accurate. I am not saying F.E.'s post is an answer to this OP's question. – Araucaria - Him Nov 29 '16 at 15:45
  • @Araucaria - The F.E. post is so lengthy that some guidance to finding the portion you're citing would be helpful. Also, if you disagree with either the conclusion or the reasoning in the answers given here, it would be extremely helpful if you were to write your own answer where you lay things out in an easy to understand way that even people who make rookie mistakes can follow easily. – aparente001 Nov 29 '16 at 15:50
  • The short answer at the top of the post is not very long and includes a quote from H&P :) – Araucaria - Him Nov 29 '16 at 16:32
  • @Araucaria - not sure what you're referring to. "Short answer at the top of the post" -- is that in the question, the other answer provided so far, a comment, or what? Remember, I wrote a rookie answer; I don't understand "H&P," and I'm not finding what you're referring to. – aparente001 Nov 29 '16 at 16:35
  • That part at the beginning of F.E.'s post entitled QUICK ANSWER IN A NUTSHELL: – Araucaria - Him Nov 29 '16 at 16:36
  • @Araucaria - F.E. wrote, "it is nevertheless condemned as incorrect or illiterate by many usage manuals." OP acknowledges having heard both versions in spoken English, but wants to know what is correct. – aparente001 Nov 29 '16 at 16:39
  • Yes, but you've missed out the "pedants" part of that and ignored the fact that H&P plainly say that such behaviour is indefensible given the bald facts of the language. – Araucaria - Him Nov 29 '16 at 16:45