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A noun phrase is a grammatical unit conventionally analyzed as headed by a noun, potentially together with dependents that modify or specify it. A single noun or pronoun can also form a minimal noun phrase under this analysis.^[ref]

In The small bird landed, the words the small bird form a noun phrase containing the head bird, the adjective small and a determiner. The whole unit occupies the subject position. Replacing it with it gives It landed, illustrating that a multiword expression can occupy a position also available to one word.

Such substitution is useful evidence for a grammatical constituent, but one test alone does not settle every structural question. A clear syntax states how the proposed head and dependents combine and tests the same account across further constructions. Counting spaces therefore measures a different property from counting noun phrases.

A pronoun is a member of a grammatical category whose uses commonly occupy nominal positions while their interpretation is recovered from context. A previous noun phrase can supply that context, but is not required: I can identify the current speaker without repeating an earlier name.^[ref]

Consider The robot moved beside the box. It stopped. Under a stipulated reading where both objects are possible referents, the spelling it alone does not select one. Grammatical number and syntax can constrain the possibilities while leaving a contextual decision unresolved. The category of the expression and the identity of its referent are distinct annotation questions.

The border with determiners also depends on the adopted scheme. Universal Dependencies documents PRON and DET using characteristic distribution and language-specific conventions. An explicit inventory helps compare text corpus annotations without assuming that a familiar label always covers exactly the same words in every language.