First Person Deixis

Overview

First person deixis is a linguistic concept dealing with words that point to the speaker’s direct involvement or perspective. These are the linguistic tools we use to establish ourselves as distinct entities within a conversation.

Key Concepts

The core of first person deixis lies in pronouns like ‘I’, ‘me’, ‘my’, and ‘mine’. It also includes verb conjugations and possessive determiners that are inherently tied to the speaker. These elements anchor the utterance to the speaker’s immediate reality and point of view.

Deep Dive

Deixis, in general, refers to words or phrases whose meaning depends on the context of the utterance, particularly the speaker, time, and place. First person deixis specifically focuses on the ‘speaker’ aspect. It’s how we signal ‘this is me’ or ‘this is mine’.

• Personal Pronouns: ‘I’, ‘we’, ‘me’, ‘us’, ‘my’, ‘our’, ‘mine’, ‘ours’.
• Verb Agreement: Often, verbs agree with the first-person subject (e.g., ‘I walk’ vs. ‘he walks’).
• Possessive Determiners: ‘My’, ‘our’.

Applications

Understanding first person deixis is crucial in linguistics, pragmatics, and even psychology. It helps analyze narrative voice, personal identity construction, and the dynamics of social interaction. It’s fundamental to how we understand who is speaking and their relationship to the subject matter.

Challenges & Misconceptions

A common misconception is that first person deixis is solely about ‘I’. However, it encompasses ‘we’ as well, which can refer to the speaker and others. Distinguishing between inclusive ‘we’ (speaker + listener) and exclusive ‘we’ (speaker + others, but not listener) is a related challenge.

FAQs

What is deixis?Deixis refers to words or phrases that have a ‘pointing’ function, whose meaning depends on the context of the utterance.

How is first person deixis different from other deixis?First person deixis specifically relates to the speaker (‘I’, ‘me’), while other types include second person (listener), third person (others), spatial (place), and temporal (time).

Are there other linguistic markers of first person?Yes, verb conjugations and certain possessive adjectives are also key indicators.