What is absolute social deixis?

Definition
	Absolute social deixis is deictic reference to some social characteristic of a referent (especially a person) apart from any relative ranking of referents.

Discussion
	Often absolute social deixis is expressed in certain forms of address. The form of address will include no comparison of the ranking of the speaker and addressee; there will be only a simple reference to the absolute status of the addressee.

Examples (English)
	Mr. President Your Honor

Generic
	Absolute social deixis is a kind of
	What is social deixis?

Source
	Levinson 1979 207

Context for this page:

Concept module: absolute social deixis
In overview module: Glossary (Linguistics): A
In modular book: Glossary of linguistic terms, by Eugene E. Loos (general editor), Susan Anderson (editor), Dwight H., Day, Jr. (editor), Paul C. Jordan (editor), and J. Douglas Wingate (editor)
In bookshelf: Linguistics

This page is an extract from the LinguaLinks Library, Version 5.0 published on CD-ROM by SIL International, 2003. [Ordering information.]

Page content last modified: 5 January 2004

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