On the use of the personal pronoun we Journal of Language and Politics 3:1 (2004), 27–52. issn 1569–2159 / e-issn 1569–9862© John Benjamins Publishing Company in communities Isabel Íñigo-Mora University of Seville The purpose of this paper is to show the existing relationships between the concept of community and the linguistic forms used to convey or even to manipulate it. First of all, the limits and restrictions of any form of commu- nity will be defined. Second, one specific form of community will be selected for analysis. The community chosen will be the Parliamentary community, and the linguistic form singled out for study will be the first person plural pronoun “we”. We will try to discover any type of relationship between (a) the scope of reference of this personal pronoun and (b) the intentions of the person who uttered it. In this way, we can see whether there is any connec- tion between personal identity (in terms of inclusion/exclusion from a group) and pronominal choice. This could also lead us to the discovery of any possible strategic use of this personal pronoun. Keywords: pronominal reference, community, parliament, manipulation, personal identity, linguistic forms 1. Introduction The purpose of this paper is to show any possible relationship between the concept of community and the linguistic forms used to express it. According to Brown and Yule (1983), language has two main functions: transactional (i.e. to communicate information) and interactional (i.e. to socialise). Taking this distinction into account, we will try to show to what extent language can mirror the kind of social relationship held among members of a community. We will start by dealing with two basic issues: community and identity. Are they stable concepts? How can we define a community? Is a community based on a kind of rational will or natural law? Do communities have fixed or