There is great variation in the use of the above three terms. Here are the definitions:
A linguistic expression is deictic if its meaning involves
deixis, i.e. reference to the speech situation.
Reference to the speech situation is typically coded in grammatical formatives, but can also be a semantic feature of certain lexical items.
Reference to the speech situation is typically coded in grammatical formatives, but can also be a semantic feature of certain lexical items.
A demonstrative is a deictic proform whose deictic features do not reduce to identification of a speech-act participant.
This definition embraces a set of alternatives:
- The deictic category involved may be any. The definition only excludes pure person deixis; thus, personal and possessive pronouns are no demonstratives.
It includes, however, demonstratives which reduce to neutral demonstration in any of the categories without involving a deictic contrast. - The grammatical category of the proform may be any. The most important kinds of demonstratives are:
- demonstrative pronoun (or pronominal demonstrative)
- demonstrative determiner (or adnominal demonstrative)
- demonstrative adverb.
A determiner is a proform which determines a nominal.
If a word, the determiner is a pro-adjective. If bound, the nominal is its morphological host.
Kinds of determiners include
- article
- possessive determiner
- demonstrative determiner
- indefinite or interrogative determiner.
Consequently:
- All demonstratives (like this) are deictic; but not all deictic expressions are demonstratives. Deictic expressions comprise grammatical formatives like personal pronouns (e.g. you) and lexemes like deictic verbs (e.g. come and go).
- A nominal demonstrative may be a determiner (like Jap. kono ‘that’) or a pronoun (like Jap. kore ‘that one’). In the languages of the world, nominal demonstratives which alternately fulfill either function, like Engl. this, are frequent.
- A determiner may be demonstrative (like that) or not (like his or the).