Deixis allows for economy of speech but introduces ambiguity when that speech is recorded.
Source: wiktionary
Deixis
//ˈdaɪksɪs//
Synonyms for "deixis" (1 found)
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Closest matches (1)
Noun(1 words)
Related word relations
OpenGloss and ConceptNet supply richer edges like generalizations, collocations, and derivations.
More general
2 entriesRelated terms
6 entriescoordinate
1 entrieshas context
1 entriesis a
2 entriesrelated to
6 entriesTranslations
23 translations across 19 languages.
Armenian
1 entries- ցուցայնություն noun (reference relying on context)
Catalan
1 entries- dixi noun (reference relying on context)
Esperanto
1 entries- deikto noun (reference relying on context)
Estonian
1 entries- deiksis noun (reference relying on context)
Finnish
1 entries- deiksis noun (reference relying on context)
French
2 entries- deixis noun (reference relying on context)
- déixis noun (reference relying on context)
Galician
1 entries- deíxe noun (reference relying on context)
German
1 entries- Deixis noun (reference relying on context)
Italian
1 entries- deissi noun (reference relying on context)
Japanese
1 entries- 直示 noun (reference relying on context)
Kazakh
1 entries- дейксис noun (reference relying on context)
Korean
1 entries- 직시 noun (reference relying on context)
Mongolian
2 entries- заах үүрэг noun (reference relying on context)
- онцлох үүрэг noun (reference relying on context)
Persian
1 entries- اشاره noun (reference relying on context)
Polish
1 entries- deixis noun (reference relying on context)
Portuguese
2 entries- dêixis noun (reference relying on context)
- díxis noun (reference relying on context)
Russian
1 entries- де́йксис noun (reference relying on context)
Spanish
2 entries- deixis noun (reference relying on context)
- deíxis noun (reference relying on context)
Vietnamese
1 entries- trực chỉ noun (reference relying on context)
Sample sentences
3 total sentences available.
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 expression ('that') to indicate something in the immediate context. Deictic expressions are also sometimes called indexicals. They are among the first forms to be spoken by very young children and […]
Source: wiktionary
For those who treat language as a generative system for objectively describing the world, deixis is a big black fly in the ointment. Deixis introduces subjective, attentional, intentional and, of course, context-dependent properties into natural languages.
Source: wiktionary
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.