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I am not sure what is the underlying rule for when the use of “it” is appropriate and when “he / she”. Consider the following two examples:

  1. There is a lady at the door. It is my aunt.
  2. Do you know the lady with the hat? Yes, she is my aunt.

My choice of “it” vs “she” is based more on a feel rather than a rule and my examples could be wrong. There is a related post which explains that “it” is used as an expletive, but I am not sure whether that is a full answer in these cases. Could someone please explain how to analyze the options?

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    It's my aunt at the door is grammatical, and therefore so is it's my aunt. The it is a dummy and doesn't refer to your aunt.
    – John Lawler
    Commented Oct 5, 2022 at 14:43
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    Other related questions: there was a previous question about this which was closed as a duplicate of a question about "It's a boy!" which has some detailed answers.
    – Stuart F
    Commented Oct 5, 2022 at 15:58
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    In your first example, the "it" is not referring to a particular person, but the "situation" of a potentially-unknown person at the door. Mnemonic: the letters "it" are contained in "situation."
    – MarkHu
    Commented Oct 6, 2022 at 0:26
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    I guess the "it" here is the same "it" as in "It's raining outside."
    – Arthur
    Commented Oct 6, 2022 at 7:24
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    @StuartF “It’s a boy!” is a special case, because bebies can be called it (a rare holdover of grammatical gender in English, going back before it split from the other West Germanic languages). For example, Exodus 2:9 in the KJV: “And Pharaoh's daughter said unto her, Take this child away, and nurse it for me, and I will give thee thy wages.”
    – Davislor
    Commented Oct 6, 2022 at 8:48

3 Answers 3

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In a comment John Lawler wrote:

It's my aunt at the door is grammatical, and therefore so is it's my aunt. The it is a dummy and doesn't refer to your aunt.

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'It' has been used as an ‘empty’ or 'dummy' subject It is ‘empty’ because it doesn’t refer to 'my aunt'.

She is my aunt. 'She' refers to the lady.

[ It's getting late.

It's raining. ]

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There's a third option, which is the "singular they". This option is if the gender/person is unknown, but you know that they're a person. For instance, take this conversation:

"Is someone at the door?"

"Yes, I can see its silhouette", instead you'd answer

"Yes, I can see their silhouette."

Because you can't see the gender of the person but you know it's a person, you'd use "they" instead of "it", or instead of "he/she"

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  • This is also preferred when a person prefers not to be identified by a singular gender or does not identify with one.
    – Amazon Dies In Darkness
    Commented Oct 7, 2022 at 4:02
  • @RockPaperLz-MaskitorCasket it's possibly worth noting that that's a fairly recent invention and while it's rapidly gaining acceptance, there are still plenty of folks who do not consider it grammatical
    – A C
    Commented Oct 7, 2022 at 20:59
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    "Is someone at the door?" "Yes, I can see their silhouette; it is my aunt at the door."
    – Aaron McMillin
    Commented Oct 10, 2022 at 18:17

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