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c. Place Deixis
Place deixis can be described along many of the same parameters that apply to time deixis Cummings, 2005: 26. So, it is, for example, that
references to place can be absolute or relational in nature. Absolute references to place locate an object or person in a specific longitude and latitude, while
relational references locate people and places in terms of each other and the speaker. From Cummings’s view, it is clear that the place deixis can be
absolute or relational depending on whether the speaker is involved in the utterance. To make it clear, the examples below are provided.
The market is ten yards from the hospital. The nearest market is about two miles away.
The place referent which locates the market in the first example is not dependent on the point of utterance: the market remains ten yards from the
hospital regardless of the location of the speaker of this utterance. However, in the second example, the market’s location may be less than two miles away
or more than two miles away depending on the location of the speaker. Furthermore, in the same way that the time deictic expression “now” can refer
to smaller or larger periods of time from the point of utterance, the place deictic term “here” can refer to the location of the speaker or to the locations
at various distances from the speaker.
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d. Discourse Deixis
According to Levinson 1983: 85, discourse deixis concerns the use of expressions within some utterance to refer to some portions of the
discourse that contains that utterance including the utterance itself. In discourse deixis, linguistic expressions are used to refer to some parts of the
wider discourse either a written text and or an oral text in which these expressions occur Cummings, 2005: 28.
From the points of view above, it can be said that the discourse deixis maintains the use of linguistic expressions to refer to some parts of the wider
discourse. A written text both occupies space and is composed and read at certain
points in time. A similar temporal dimension is conferred on an oral text through the time-specific acts of speaker production and addressee reception.
Given these spatial and temporal aspects of oral and written texts, it is unremarkable that discourse deixis should be expressed through many of the
same linguistic elements that are used to express space and time deixis Cummings, 2005: 28.
In short, in order to analyze discourse deixis, it is important to pay attention to both spatial and temporal aspects of oral and written texts and to
express them through many of the same linguistic elements. The examples below are provided to make the explanation clear.
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You made a strong opinion there. That opinion was weak.
In the next section I present the reasons why I chose the topic. The last chapter was the most interesting.
In the first two utterances, the place deictic terms “there” and “that” locate an opinion within a prior discourse context. In the final two utterances,
the time deictic expressions “next” and “last” have as their referents some parts of the forthcoming and preceding discourse context respectively.
Interestingly, the spatially deictic terms “there” and “that” assume temporal prominence in the first two utterances. Their deictic function in these
utterances is akin to the temporal deictic function of “this” and “that” in “this Sunday” and “that Sunday” and is related to the unfolding of these utterances
in real time as part most likely of an oral text. In this way, the speaker of the first utterance is referring to an opinion that the addressee has made some
time earlier. Also, the claim that is mentioned in the second example precedes in time the utterance that refers to it. In the final two utterances, the time
deictic expressions “next” and “last” exhibit a spatial dimension. These terms specify a section and a chapter that occupy physical space in a written text
before the space occupied by the utterance “the last chapter” and after the space occupied by the utterance “the next section”. However, even the
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spatial character of the terms “next” and “last” has its origin in a temporal dimension – a section that is spatially “next” to an utterance is one that is
realized at a future time to that utterance. After all, It emerges that features of temporal deixis underline the expressions that are used to convey discourse
deixis.
2. Implicature
Kategori