yer man

What it means

1. 1.

   That man; the man we both know about but are not naming. The female form is 'yer wan'.

2. 2.

   A stranger being pointed out, with a hint that he is being judged: 'yer man over there'.

In use

• Yer man from the bank rang again.

  Note: Used when the speaker assumes the listener knows perfectly well who is meant.

• Yer wan off the telly, what's her name.

Where it comes from

The possessive is not literal — he is not your man. It parallels the Irish 'mo dhuine', literally 'my person', used the same way for an unnamed third party, and is one of the clearest cases of Irish sentence habits surviving the switch to English.

Other forms

Spellings and variants:

yer wan, your man