Deictic

Deictic, or deixis, is a term in linguistics and semiotics referring to expressions whose interpretation depends on contextual information. Deictic expressions point to features of the speech situation, such as who is speaking, who is being addressed, where the speaker is, and when the utterance occurs. The central reference point is the deictic center, typically the current speaker, but it can shift in discourse or narration, a phenomenon known as deictic projection.

The major domains of deixis are person, time, and place. Person deixis covers pronouns and possessives that indicate participants in the discourse (I, you, he, my/mine). Time deixis anchors events to the moment of speaking (now, then, yesterday, tomorrow). Place deixis locates things in space relative to the speaker (here, there) and can involve proximal and distal distinctions. Some languages also have directional or path deixis, tying reference to spatial orientation or movement relative to the speaker. Social deixis encodes information about relationships, status, or politeness, though this facet is discussed differently across linguistic theories.

Demonstratives (this, that, these, those) and deictic adverbs are the most common deictic forms in many languages. Deixis can be encoded in pronouns, determiners, adverbs, or even verb morphology in some languages. In narrative and reported speech, shifting the deictic center or projecting deixis into quotes is a typical way speakers convey distance from the original context. Deixis contrasts with deixis-free references such as explicit, context-independent descriptions and with anaphora, which relies on prior discourse rather than the immediate context. Sign languages also employ deixis through pointing and spatial referencing.