deixis
/ˈdaɪksɪs/
More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations
uncommon/deɪˈɪksɪs/
deixis noun: the use of a word, such as a particle or pronoun, to refer to something that must be identified from the immediate physical, temporal, or grammatical context; a word used in such a way.
Noun
deixis (countable and uncountable, plural deixes)
- The use of a word, such as a particle or pronoun, to refer to something that must be identified from the immediate physical, temporal, or grammatical context; a word used in such a way.
- Deixis allows for economy of speech but may introduce ambiguity in recorded speech when referring to something physical.
- Deixis is a technical term (from Greek) for one of the most basic things we do with utterances. It means 'pointing' via language. Any linguistic form used to accomplish this 'pointing' is called a deictic expression. When you notice a strange object and ask, 'What's that?', you are using a deictic...[1996, George Yule, Pragmatics, Oxford University Press, →ISBN, page 9
- Synonyms:
- indexicality
deixis meaning in Persian and Vietnamese
deixis in Persian
- reference relying on context
- اشاره
deixis in Vietnamese
- reference relying on context
- trực chỉ
Examples of deixis in a sentence
- Deixis is a technical term (from Greek) for one of the most basic things we do with utterances.[1996, George Yule, Pragmatics, Oxford University Press, →ISBN, page 9:
- For those who treat language as a generative system for objectively describing the world, deixis is a big black fly in the ointment.2006, Stephen C. Levinson, “Dexis”, in Laurence R. Horn, Gregory Ward, editors, The Handbook of Pragmatics, Wiley-Blackwell, →ISBN, page 97:
Synonyms of deixis
Forms of deixis
| plural | deixes |
|---|
Origin of deixis
From Ancient Greek δεῖξις (deîxis, “pointing, indicating, reference”), from δείκνυμι (deíknumi, “I show”).
Questions about deixis
- What does deixis mean?
- Deixis means the use of a word, such as a particle or pronoun, to refer to something that must be identified from the immediate physical, temporal, or grammatical context; a word used in such a way.
- What is deixis in Persian?
- Deixis in Persian is اشاره. See Deixis meaning in Persian.
- How do you use deixis in a sentence?
- Deixis is a technical term (from Greek) for one of the most basic things we do with utterances.
- What part of speech is deixis?
- Deixis is a noun.
- How do you pronounce deixis?
- Deixis is pronounced /ˈdaɪksɪs/.
- What is the plural of deixis?
- The plural of deixis is deixes.
Words near deixis in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: deixis (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Jtle515-deixis.wav, LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-deixis.wav.
Cite this entry: “deixis.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/deixis. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.