You can think of themselves as a mirror turned back on a group: the people who do something are the very same people it lands on. From that one idea — the action bouncing back to its own — come all the other uses: pointing emphatically at exactly those people, standing for one unnamed person, and a handful of fixed phrases (by themselves, to themselves, in themselves, not feel themselves) that all keep that 'the group itself, on its own' feeling.

可以想成一面照回自己的鏡子:做某件事的那群人,正好也是這件事落到的那群人。動作彈回到做事者本身——這個核心畫面長出後面所有用法:用力指向「正是那群人」、代替一個沒講明性別的單一個人、以及幾個固定片語(by/to/in themselves、not feel themselves),它們都還帶著「那群人自己、靠自己」的味道。

登入就可以看每一支怎麼連回核心畫面。

原始詞典資料2 筆記錄

以下是外部詞典記錄的用法,摘錄並精簡格式,我們還沒有寫成教學內容。上面的說明才是我們自己寫的;有些用法可能上面已經講過了。

themselvespron/ðɛmˈsɛlvz/

  • 1

    The reflexive case of they, the third-person plural personal pronoun. The group of people, animals, or objects previously mentioned, as the object of a verb or following a preposition (also used for emphasis).

    • They’ve hurt themselves.
    • They fought among themselves.
  • 2

    The reflexive case of they, the third-person singular personal pronoun. The single person previously mentioned, as the object of a verb or following a preposition (also used for emphasis).

    • Would whoever stole my phone please make themselves known.
    • I don't want anyone to fight among themselves.

摘錄自 英文維基詞典 English Wiktionary,已精簡格式;依 CC BY-SA 4.0 授權使用,改動後的內容同樣以此授權提供。