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    Deixis and Grammar

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    Jen Lazo
    The document discusses how deixis, or contextual reference, is seen in direct and indirect speech structures in English grammar. Specifically, it notes that direct speech uses proximal deictic forms like "this evening" that reference the speaker's context, while indirect speech shifts to distal forms like "there this evening" that reference a more removed context. This difference in deictic forms serves to mark the distinction between direct speech that places the listener in the same context, and indirect speech that makes the original speech seem more remote.

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    Deixis and Grammar

    Uploaded by

    Jen Lazo
    116 views1 page
    The document discusses how deixis, or contextual reference, is seen in direct and indirect speech structures in English grammar. Specifically, it notes that direct speech uses proximal deictic forms like "this evening" that reference the speaker's context, while indirect speech shifts to distal forms like "there this evening" that reference a more removed context. This difference in deictic forms serves to mark the distinction between direct speech that places the listener in the same context, and indirect speech that makes the original speech seem more remote.

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    DEIXIS AND GRAMMAR

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    The document discusses how deixis, or contextual reference, is seen in direct and indirect speech structures in English grammar. Specifically, it notes that direct speech uses proximal deictic forms like "this evening" that reference the speaker's context, while indirect speech shifts to distal forms like "there this evening" that reference a more removed context. This difference in deictic forms serves to mark the distinction between direct speech that places the listener in the same context, and indirect speech that makes the original speech seem more remote.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as docx, pdf, or txt
    116 views1 page

    Deixis and Grammar

    Uploaded by

    Jen Lazo
    The document discusses how deixis, or contextual reference, is seen in direct and indirect speech structures in English grammar. Specifically, it notes that direct speech uses proximal deictic forms like "this evening" that reference the speaker's context, while indirect speech shifts to distal forms like "there this evening" that reference a more removed context. This difference in deictic forms serves to mark the distinction between direct speech that places the listener in the same context, and indirect speech that makes the original speech seem more remote.

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    DEIXIS AND GRAMMAR

    • The distinctions for person, spatial, and temporal deixis can be seen at work in English grammar structures such as
    DIRECT and INDIRECT (reported)SPEECH.

    For example:

    a) Are you planning to be here this evening?

    Direct speech

    b) I asked her if she was planning to be there this evening.

    Indirect/reported speech

    Direct speech the person who owns the words will be delivering it.

    Indirect speech is delivered by an intermediate person to the rest of the people.

    The proximal forms presented in [a.] have shifted to the corresponding distal forms in [b.].

    - This very regular difference in English reported discourse marks a distinction between the 'near speaker' means
    the direct speech and the 'away from speaker' means of indirect speech.

    The proximal deictic forms of a direct speech reporting communicate, often dramatically, a sense of being in the
    same context as the utterance. The distal deictic forms of indirect speech reporting make the original speech
    event seem more remote.

    - proximal this is something that is located near the point of origin. While distal located away from the center of
    the body. Both terms are used in relationship to each other. In other words, the term distal means ‘further
    away’ (from the center or the body); whereas proximal means ‘closest to’

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