This That These Those

Getting Past the Confusion of English Demonstratives

Most Portuguese speakers map English demonstratives directly to Portuguese ones, and it works until it doesn't. The mapping feels obvious at first. This becomes isto, that becomes aquilo, and plural forms line up neatly too. The problem starts the moment you try to use them in actual sentences, especially when the distance between speaker and listener gets fuzzy. I learned this the hard way when I was editing a technical manual for a Brazilian engineering team. They had written something like "This process requires calibration" when they actually meant "That process over there requires calibration." The word this was referring to something distant, not something close. It sounded wrong to any native ear but completely grammatically correct on paper. That one mistake showed me how deeply the distance concept is baked into these words, and how little most learners think about it.

Understanding this that these those in context

The four words split along two axes: proximity and number. This and these point to things near the speaker. That and those point to things away from the speaker. This is singular and close. That is singular and distant. These is plural and close. Those is plural and distant. But proximity isn't only physical. I found this out when explaining to a colleague why we'd say "I prefer this option" even when both options were sitting on a table in front of us. The choice itself felt closer because it was the one being discussed, highlighted, or emotionally invested in. Physical distance and psychological distance are two different things, and English uses the same words for both. When speaking on the phone, you'll hear native speakers use this for things happening right now and that for things the other person just mentioned. It's a conversational habit that doesn't show up in textbooks. My workaround for situations like this was simple: whenever I caught myself using the wrong demonstrative, I stopped and physically pointed at the object or gestured toward where it was located. The gesture forced my brain to recalibrate the distance before I spoke again. After doing this consistently for about three weeks, the wrong choices dropped off almost entirely.

How Distance Actually Works in Real Speech

The proximity rule breaks down in a few specific ways that trip people up constantly. One of the most common is when someone refers to something just said. If I tell you something and you respond with "That makes sense," you're using that for your own statement. It feels counter-intuitive because the idea just left your mouth, but in English, what the listener receives is "that" while what the speaker produces is "this." The direction of flow matters more than physical placement. Another edge case appears in writing. When you write an essay and refer back to a paragraph you just finished, you naturally reach for that. Even though the paragraph is literally above your cursor, it's conceptually behind you in the text. Using this there would sound off to a native reader. I caught myself doing this during a university paper and got red-penciled on three separate paragraphs. The correction wasn't about grammar rules, it was about narrative flow.

Common mistakes and how to fix them

Portuguese speakers regularly overuse this in situations where that belongs. The main reason is that Portuguese uses o/a/s/os more flexibly for distant reference, and learners carry that habit over. A phrase like "This is why I'm leaving" often should be "That is why I'm leaving" if you're referring to a situation the other person already understands or described. Another mistake is treating these and those as interchangeable with here and there. They're related but not identical. Here and there describe location. These and those describe reference. Saying "these people over there" mixes the frames awkwardly. Better to say "those people over there" or "these people right here." For advanced usage, consider how demonstratives function as pronouns replacing nouns. This book, that book, these books, those books — the demonstrative + noun structure is straightforward. But when you drop the noun and use them alone, the distance ambiguity increases. "I'll take this" versus "I'll take that" at a store sounds natural to natives but nearly impossible to calibrate for learners who haven't internalized the speaker-centered frame. The workaround I use now is a quick mental check before speaking: am I pointing toward myself or away from myself? If the answer involves something the listener just introduced, default to that. If I'm introducing something new and it's physically near me, default to this. Plural versions follow the same logic. It takes about ten seconds per sentence during the learning phase but eventually becomes automatic.

When These Words Fail You

There are situations where demonstratives simply don't work well. In informal speech, many native speakers replace these and those with stuff or things when the count doesn't matter. "Pass me those" becomes "Pass me that stuff" and carries the same meaning with less precision. This isn't a learner problem, it's a native shortcut that removes the plural distinction entirely. Demonstratives also struggle with abstract concepts that have no physical anchor. Discussing emotions, ideas, or time periods often forces a choice between this and that that feels arbitrary. "This summer was terrible" and "That summer was terrible" can both be correct depending on whether you're currently living through it or looking back. The distinction is temporal proximity, not physical proximity, and it's easy to get wrong under pressure. If you're in a professional setting and need to be precise about distance, consider adding a prepositional phrase instead of relying on the demonstrative alone. "This document right here" or "Those files over there" eliminates ambiguity. It adds words but saves misunderstandings that could cost hours of clarification later.

Practical drills that actually work

The most effective exercise I found was describing objects in a room aloud while standing still. Pick an object within arm's reach and say "this is a pen." Walk three steps away and say "that is a pen." Then pick up a group of items and practice "these are pens" versus pointing across the room and saying "those are pens." Repeat until the difference feels physical rather than intellectual. Reading dialogues out loud helps too. Pick a script, read one character using this and these, then read the other character's lines using that and those. The role reversal forces you to think from the listener's perspective, which is where most errors come from. I did this for about twenty minutes a day over two weeks and noticed a measurable improvement in my spontaneous speech. Recording yourself and comparing it to a native speaker's version of the same sentences highlights mismatches faster than any grammar explanation. Listen for whether the demonstrative matches the visual context. If the speaker is pointing at something far away but says "this," note the mismatch and move on. Most of the time the match is correct, and catching the exceptions trains your ear.