This mini episode reveals another “Secret of Native Speakers.” This one is a common—but strange—way to use the word “me.”
Episode 166 of the Everybody ESL podcast is a grammar mini episode that reveals another Secret of Native Speakers: a very common—but unexpected—way to use the word “me.” (Find other Secrets of Native Speakers in episodes 66, 69, 81, 102, 117, 131, and 162.) Send your questions about English and your suggestions for future episodes to EverybodyESL@gmail.com! (And let me know if you’d like to record the introduction to a future episode.)
I'm back with another… Secret of Native Speakers. That’s right: this is another Secret of Native Speakers. This is something that all native speakers know but something that your teacher or your textbook will probably not tell you about.
Today I’m going to tell you about something that is very, very common in casual spoken English. You will never see this in formal or written English, but it is very common in conversational English. It’s all about a certain kind of compound subject. Do you know what a compound subject is? A compound subject is a subject that consists of two parts. A compound subject is “this and that.” And when one of those parts of a compound subject is I—when the speaker is talking about himself or herself—and someone or something else, there is something strange that native English speakers often do.
This is the kind of compound subject I'm talking about: "my friend and I," "the new student in school and I," "my brother and I." With that kind of compound subject, native speakers often make sentences like these:
Me and my friend will study together later, or
Me and the new student in school have the same classes, or
Me and my brother made dinner tonight.
That's right: in some special cases we can use me as a subject. That's strange, isn't it? We don't usually think of the word me as the subject. We can never say something like, “Me will watch TV later tonight,” or “Me spent all day studying.” That is never okay. That's always weird. Very strange. No native speaker would ever say a sentence like that. But we can use me as a subject when it is part of a compound subject, and it is very informal spoken English.
My advice to you is do not use sentences like that when you are taking an English test or when you are speaking to your teacher. But if you want to use natural-sounding English, then, in the right situation, you can use subjects like that, like “me and my friend,” or “me and the new student in school,” or “me and my brother.”
And that is this episode’s Secret of Native Speakers.