[English] Is omitting pronouns seen as tacky or confusing in writing (or speech)?

[devilyoudont]

I hardly ever drop pronouns--feels kind of rude to me. But it isn't incorrect to do so.

[Adrianslont]

I drop first person singular all the time when writing informally, but not as often in speaking.

Do other people drop any other pronouns? It doesn’t seem like anyone has emphasized it’s only first person singular that gets dropped, or maybe it’s assumed everyone knows that. (Though maybe other people do drop other pronouns, so I am genuinely asking.)

I guess you must be writing formally here! .

About your question, “do other people drop any other pronouns?” - second person gets dropped a lot in questions in the world of advertising eg. “Looking for the best bank loan? Come and talk to us at ...”

[arthaey]

Agree with everyone else's comments re: tone/perception.

I see what you did they. Not gonna let it slide!

[Jaleel10]

Thanks for everyone's responses! I really enjoyed reading through each of them.

[Daniel N.]

I hear it in pop/rock/rap songs all the time. But I got an impression that we can be also left out.

The first entry in Helen Fielding’s novel Bridget Jones’s Diary includes the lament: “Cannot quite believe I am once again starting the year in a single bed in my parents’ house.”

Why Do We Delete the Initial Pronoun From Our Sentences? Glad You Asked.

Maybe English is slowly going Non-French-Romance/Western&South Slavic. Welcome

[Daniel N.]

It's interesting how languages are moving in both directions. We know the ultimate parent language of English, Spanish, Russian, Greek etc. (Proto-Indo-European) didn't have mandatory subject pronouns.

Common Slavic didn't have it either, and Old Russian (as far as I know) didn't. But today's Russian is moving (esp. in speech) into more and more subject pronouns used, even though it's obvious from verb endings who the subject is. All Western and South Slavic languages omit subject pronouns unless really needed (there are complex rules).

Latin didn't have mandatory subject pronouns: Spanish and Italian don't have them today. But French moved in the mandatory direction. Portuguese uses a lot of them in speech.

All Germanic languages have mandatory subject pronouns, but English is moving in the free direction as we speak.

Finnish didn't have mandatory subject pronouns, but today spoken Finnish has (almost?) mandatory subject pronouns.

In this map you can see mandatory subject pronouns (red dots) are actually a North European and Western African areal feature, almost unknown in other parts of the world:

WALS map: Feature 101A: Expression of Pronominal Subjects

The blue dots (endings on the verb) is the most common way in almost all parts of the world.

[MrsStarez]

I’m a native English speaker, and I do have a tendency to do this sometimes in emails or WhatsApp-ing with friends. It’s not something I’m particularly proud of - it’s just a bad habit that has crept in and that I’m trying to stop.

In my opinion, it’s not great practice, and definitely not something for more formal communications.

[golyplot]

As a native speaker (USA), I would strongly recommend not doing things like the example in the OP. It is common to drop a pronoun or two when writing informally, but a whole paragraph like that just sounds weird regardless of the context. And even dropping pronouns at all is more like something you would do when texting your friend than emailing someone you don't know, with the exception of the common situations already noted in the thread where pronouns are dropped.

So yes, I would describe the initial example as tacky.

[dampingwire]

So yes, I would describe the initial example as tacky.

Completely agree.

[Soclydeza]

Depends on the context, that original example is maybe how I might text a friend in a short message or something, but if I encountered that in a more business/professional environment I would think person isn't taking whatever he/she's writing about seriously, it wouldnt look good.

As for confusing, your example worked out well because you ("I") were the subject throughout the whole thing, but if you were telling a story like that where the subject changes and you didn't at least introduce the he/she/they/you/it before each change, I would be really confused. In some languages (Italian for example) it works because the verb gets conjugated in enough different ways to tell you who/what the subject is, but English only conjugates 2-3 different ways, not enough information.

Your English is very good though, so you really just have to practice and make it a habit.