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We can say 'A brother of mine is a doctor.' The more common way of saying is 'One of my brothers is a doctor.'

But in a case where a listener knows my brother or I have only one brother.

Should we write 'the brother of me is a doctor.' Using 'mine' is wrong here as Mine would represent 'my brothers'(more than one brothers) ?

I know there are other better ways to say it but I want to know that this one is grammatically correct or not.

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    If you have several brothers, you might feasibly say A brother of mine is a doctor (but note that's "marked" unusual phrasing compared to One of my brothers is a doctor). But if there's only one brother, no native speaker would ever say The brother of mine is a doctor in any normal context (I can't think of an "abnormal" context where it might be said; perhaps there isn't one). For the single brother context, it would almost always be My brother is a doctor. Mar 2, 2022 at 16:46
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    What is the problem? If you know there is a better ways to say this, then use the better ways. How will you use a sentence that is grammatical but completely non-idiomatic?
    – James K
    Mar 2, 2022 at 20:50
  • @JamesK okay, 'the brother of me' is not meaningful or it's non-idiomatic. Or, it's not any of them. From your comment I can understand it is grammatical but not used.
    – RADS
    Mar 3, 2022 at 2:05
  • @FumbleFingers when I searched on Google 'the brother of mine' I got many results. One result was a name of book 'brother of mine' written in 1994 by an English author and Journalist. It's a story of rivalry between two brothers written by one of the two. But 'the' is not included in the title.
    – RADS
    Mar 3, 2022 at 2:19
  • @RADS: brother/sister of mine (no article) was a stylised form of address in English centuries ago, so you'll find many written instances preceded by O and Oh. That's the usage reflected by Westwood's 1994 book - but it's essentially a "frozen, literary" form that wouldn't normally be used in conversational contexts today (except facetiously). Mar 3, 2022 at 18:04

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You seem to be thinking that "mine" is only used with a plural. That is incorrect.

In general, we rarely say "[whatever] of mine". We generally say "my [whatever]". But "of mine" is grammatically valid.

One of my brothers is a doctor. <- valid and the common way we would say this

A brother of mine is a doctor. <- valid but fairly uncommon

My brother is a doctor. <- valid and common

The brother of mine is a doctor. <- grammatically valid but I've never heard someone say this

Okay, someone MIGHT use that phrasing if he was contrasting his brother with someone else's brother. Like:

"Jack and I both have brothers who went to Podunk University. The brother of Jack is now an engineer and the brother of mine is now a doctor." Less weird sounding but still unlikely. We'd be more likely to say, "Jack's brother ... but my brother ..."

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  • when I searched on Google 'the brother of mine' I got many results. One result was the name of a book 'brother of mine' written in 1994 by an English author and Journalist. It's a story of rivalry between two brothers written by one of the two. But 'the' is not included in the title. So when you read its title then it sounds uncommon to you as a native.
    – RADS
    Mar 3, 2022 at 7:09
  • And yeah I was thinking that of mine is used with plurals....so it's grammatically valid to say 'the bag of mine' but we avoid saying like that in general life?
    – RADS
    Mar 3, 2022 at 7:12
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    A friend of mine is much more commonly used, with the sense "Their name isn't important in this context, but it's just someone I know quite well". You might say a brother of mine if you had several brothers and were just making a passing reference to one of them when speaking to a stranger. Mar 3, 2022 at 9:09
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    @RADS Few would say, "the bag of mine". We'd be much more likely to say "my bag".
    – Jay
    Mar 3, 2022 at 14:36
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    @KateBunting Fair enough.
    – Jay
    Mar 3, 2022 at 14:36
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If the listener knows your brother, or that you only have one, what's wrong with My brother is a doctor?

You would only use a brother of mine if the listener doesn't know him and his identity is unimportant - you are just saying it to explain why you know something about the medical profession.

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    Commenting rather than downvoting—the OP does say "I know there are other better ways to say it but I want to know that this one is grammatically correct or not." The question isn't about alternatives, but about the "___ of mine" construction. Mar 2, 2022 at 18:54
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No, never is brother of me right. Very simple.

  • A brother of mine.
  • Brothers of mine.

of mine, of yours, of his/hers, of ours, of yours, of theirs.

Those are the correct possessive pronouns after of.

That's it.

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