Reflexive possessive pronouns (swój)

The Reflexive Possessive Pronoun: swój

In Polish, swój is a special possessive pronoun meaning "one's own". It is used whenever the item being described belongs to the subject of the sentence.

For the third person (he/she/they), using swój is essential. If you say "he took his laptop" using the regular pronoun (jego), it implies he took another man's laptop! To say he took his own laptop, you must use swój. For "I" and "you", it translates to "my own" or "your own", and is very commonly used instead of mój or twój.

Masculine Forms of swój

The pronoun swój shares the exact same ending patterns as mój and twój. For masculine inanimate objects (like laptop or zegarek), the form is swój in both the Nominative (subject) and Accusative (direct object) cases.

Using swój is a great way to clearly contrast the subject's own belongings with someone else's.

Feminine Forms of swój

For feminine nouns, the forms also mirror the patterns you already know:

• Nominative (Subject): swoja (like moja)
• Accusative (Direct Object): swoją (like moją)

When a feminine item belonging to the subject is the direct object of a verb, use swoją.

Listing Multiple Items

When listing several of the subject's belongings, you only need to use the possessive pronoun once at the beginning of the list. The pronoun simply matches the gender and case of the first noun it sits next to, even if the later items have a different gender.

In the sentence above, swoją matches the feminine ładowarka, but its meaning carries over to the masculine słownik. If the first word in the list is masculine, you use swój.