DEIXIS AND ANAPHORA

There are many words in the language that cannot be interpreted alone without being put in a context. This paper discusses how to interpret the meaning of words by studying the features of deixis and anaphora.

1. Deixis
Deixis is a Greek word for pointing or indicating. Kreidler (1998:144) states that in order to understand the referents in the utterance, the speaker and the hearer have to share the same context or situation in which the referents are used. Deixis concerns the ways in which language express features of the context of utterance or speech event in different way.
(1) I will be back in an hour is written on a piece of paper on someone’s office door. Because the reader was not present when the note was written, the reader does not know when it was written and when the writer will be back.
Saeed (2003:182) points out that every language has a word or phrase which relates an utterance to time, place or person. In addition, deixis is clearly tied to the speaker’s context. According to Cruse (2004:332) referent is located using the current speech event or one or more of its participants as reference points. Therefore, (2) Lee is over there contains a dietic locative expression. Lou is located with respect to the speaker. Lee is relatively distant from the speaker. This enables the hearer to pick out the referent (Lee) correctly.

1.2 Spatial Deixis
Spatial deixis specifies the location relative to the speaker and the addressee. Kreidler (1998:145) uses the term locative expression which designate space close to the speaker or farther away. Spatial deixis concerns the locations relative to anchorage points in the speech event (speaker = center). There are two basic ways of referring objects: by describing or naming them and locating them. Locations can be specified relative to other objects (3) The station is two hundred yards from the cathedral. Locations can be specified relative to the location of participants (4) It’s two hundred yards away. There are some pure place-deitic: here/there (adverbs) and this/that (demonstrative pronouns). Take the examples below:
(5) Bring that red chair here and take this blue chair there.
The word here refers to the location near the speaker (proximal) while there refers to the location away from the speaker (distal). In addition to this, the word that indicates that the object (red chair) is close to the speaker’s location whereas the word this indicates that the object (blue chair) is beyond the speaker’s location.

1.3 Person Deixis
Person deixis is any expression used to point to a person. Saeed (2003: 187) mentions that person deixis concerns with the roles of participants: the first person, the second person and the third person. Cruse (2004:333) argues that person deixis involves the speaker (the first person), the addressee (the second person), and neither speaker nor hearer (the third person). When Koko says (4) I missed the train, the word I refers to Koko. When Lulu says (4) I missed the train, the word I refers to Lulu. If the two persons do not only refer to themselves while talking, there is a third person (= the person they are talking about), which do not have to take part in the conversation (5) Harry broke up with his girl friend.

1.4 Social Deixis
Social deixis concerns social relationship between participants, their status, and relation to the topic of the discourse (Cruse 2004:336). The pronoun system used depends on the relationship of the participant of the conversation (Saeed 2003:188). The honorific form is used to show respect (6) Good evening, Mr. President.

1.5 Temporal Deixis
Cruse (2004: 334) asserts that “temporal deixis locates points or intervals on the time axis, using the moment of utterance as a reference point.” He further explains that there are three major divisions: before the moment of utterance, at the time of utterance, and after the time of utterance. The sentence (7) The meeting will be held next week was written on the notice board by Mr Smith, the Marketing Manager. Next week is a deitic expression which means the week after the speaker or the writer is in at the time of utterance. As a result, if A reads the notice on Monday, next week for A is next Monday. If B reads the notice on Wednesday, next week for B is next Wednesday.

1.6 Discourse Deixis
Discourse deixis is any expression used to refer to earlier or forthcoming segment of a discourse. Cruse (2004:336) points out that discourse deixis concerns the use of expressions referring to apart of the discourse. In discourse deixis, there are many words and phrases in English that indicate the relationship between utterance and prior discourse such as: but, therefore, in conclusion, to the contrary, however, besides, after all, etc.
(8) The boy stole a bike. Therefore, he was arrested yesterday.
Therefore functions as a connecting word between the utterance he was arrested and the prior sentence The boy stole a bike.

1.7 Gestural and Symbolic Deixis
Gestural deixis can only be interpreted with reference to an audio-visual tactile, and in general a physical, monitoring of the speech event. The hearer has to be able to see the speaker and their gesture (Cruse, 2004: 337) Instances would be demonstrative pronouns used with a selecting gesture, as in (9) You, you, but not you are dismissed or a second third person pronouns used with some physical indication of the referent, as in (10) He’s not my son, he is. He’s my nephew.
Cruse (2004: 338) says that symbolic deixis requires for their interpretation only knowledge of the basic temporal parameters of the speech event. Thus, it is sufficient to know the general location of the participants in order to interpret (11) This city is beautiful. Another example is to know when the interaction is taking place in order to know which calendar year is being referred to (12) We can’t afford a holiday this year.

2. Anaphora and Cataphora
According to Kreidler (1998: 145), anaphora is an instance of expression referring to backward utterance. Consider the sentence below:
(12) Mary and her sister live with their aunt in Bali.
Mary and her sister is termed antecedent and the pronoun their is termed anaphoric pronoun. Antecedent and anaphor must agree with respect to number, person and gender. This relationship of indirect reference is called anaphora (Saeed 2003:198). Thus, Mary and her sister and their are co-referential. On the contrary, cataphora is the coreference of one expression with another expression which follows it. The following expression provides the information necessary for the interpretation of the preceding one. In other words, cataphora is an expression referring forward to another expression, for example:
(13) If you need some, there’s some milk in the fridge. [some refers forward to some milk]

References

Cruse, Allan. 2004. Meaning In Language: An Introduction to Semantics and Pragmatics.
(2nd edn) Oxford: University Press.
James R. Hurford, Brendan Heasly, and Michael B. Smith, (eds.). 2007. Semantics as a
Course. (2nd edn). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Kreidler, James W. 1998. Introducing English Semantics. London: Routledge.
Saeed, John I. 2003. Semantics. (2nd edn). New York: Blackwell.