One, you, weandtheyare generic personal pronouns. We can useone, you, weandtheyto refer to ‘people in general’.
One,youandwe
We can useone,youorwewhen we are making generalisations and not referring to any one person in particular. When used like this,one, youandwecan include the speaker or writer:
Onecan use the Internet without understanding cookies.(orYoucan use …orWecan use …)
Youusually need a raincoat in Ireland. It rains a lot.
Wetend to avoid talking about money.
Oneis much more formal thanyouorwe, and is rare in speaking:
Onewould have thought that agreement could be reached easily on that matter.
We can useone’sbefore a noun as a possessive determiner:
Conversations withone’schildren are extremely predictable, especially as they hit adolescence.
They
We can usetheyto talk about a wide group of people, such as an authority or an institution. In such cases,theydoes not refer to specific people:
They’re chopping down the rainforests.
They’ve opened a new cinema in the town centre.
Theystarted running yoga classes at the school.
We usetheyandthemto refer back to the indefinite pronounssomeone, anyone, everyone(underlined below) when we do not know the number or gender. We also usetheyandthemin question tags:
Ifsomeonecomes with a parcel for me, can you askthemto take it next door.
I believeanyonecan do anything iftheyreally want to enough, can’tthey?
See also:
Pronouns: personal (I, me,you,him,it,they, etc.)
Pronouns: possessive (my,mine,your,yours, etc.)
Possessive’s
One