ATLAS OF LANGUAGE

AT-CORE-239-039 · ATLAS 260

Deictic origo

The origin of a deictic coordinate system, usually the here, now, and I of the speech situation.

Part of the subject path Pragmatics and Conversation

Why is this entry in the Atlas?

A · Analytical concept R2 · Necessary foundation

Deictic origo supplies the reference centre required to interpret shifted quotation and narration. Its person, time and place coordinates need reconstruction and may split rather than forming one permanent location in the world.

Colours and admission grounds

The rectangular label identifies the entry function: F – linguistic figure or procedure; A – analytical concept; G – foundational concept; E – selected concrete case. The rounded badge indicates the admission ground: R1 – distinctive contribution; R2 – necessary foundation; R3 – justified illustrative case. This editorial rationale explains the current selection rather than claiming an undocumented original selection history.

Explanation

The deictic origo is the origin of a coordinate system from which expressions such as “I,” “here,” “now,” “this,” or motion verbs are interpreted. In a prototypical speech event, person, place, and time coordinates coincide with the speaker, location, and moment of utterance. Narrative, quotation, sign language, and digital communication can shift or split these coordinates. A person saying “tomorrow here” presupposes a perspectival centre that hearers must reconstruct. The origo is therefore not a fixed point in the world but a linguistically established perspective. Its conceptual movement reveals how reference arises from situatedness and how shifting perspective reorganises an entire referential field.

Movement of thought

1. An utterance contains deictic forms whose reference does not follow from lexical meaning alone. 2. Interpreters establish person, spatial, and temporal coordinates as a provisional origin of reference. 3. From this origin, proximity, distance, direction, present time, and participant roles acquire relational order. 4. Quotation, narrative perspective, or an imagined standpoint shifts coordinates and tests whether the assumed origo holds. 5. Reference returns as perspectival work: a small displacement of origin reorganises the whole field.

Scientific use case

Pragmatics, semantics, narratology, and typology study deictic systems, perspective shift, and frames of reference. Experiments test how hearers weight competing origo candidates in quotation, video, or virtual environments.

Example

In a recorded message, “I will be here again tomorrow” differs depending on whether “here” means the recording location, playback location, or a previously agreed meeting place.

Counterexample

An absolute geographical reference such as a fixed northern coordinate does not require the speaker’s present location. It may combine with deixis but is not itself determined by an origo in the same sense.

Distinction

Distinguish the origo from absolute, relative, and intrinsic frames of reference. It is the deictic coordinate centre; a person-oriented demonstrative system may grammatically distinguish several personal centres.

Effect on thought and perception

The origo anchors language in a situation and enables economical reference. Unnoticed perspective shifts may disorient or privilege one person’s standpoint as self-evident.

Resonance

A here arises only against a there, a now against a later. From an almost invisible origin, language stretches out an entire world of relations.

Etymology

Technical core term; individual etymological review pending

Provenance

Unresolved relation network → second core-concept review → Metzler/HWRh cross-check → ATLAS 239

Cite this entry

Reich, Michael (Hrsg./ed.): „Deictic origo“. Atlas der Sprache, AT-CORE-239-039. ATLAS 260, data model 1.6.0. https://atlasoflanguage.com/concept/AT-CORE-239-039

https://atlasoflanguage.com/concept/AT-CORE-239-039

The address remains stable; editorial content may evolve. Editorial reading state: 2026-10-15. Include your access date for precise references.

Historical background

Karl Bühler’s theory of deixis organises pointing expressions around an origo: the I, here and now of the speech situation. Person, spatial and temporal expressions receive reference relative to this origin. Bühler’s Deixis am Phantasma also allows the origo to move to an imagined standpoint; later research describes such shifts as deictic projection and notes that person, space and time need not move together. The origo is therefore not merely a physical point but a structured centre of orientation. Bühler’s German theory is accessed here through Diessel’s discussion and attributed quotations; the 1934 original has not been directly collated. This establishes scholarly mediation, not a complete lexical genealogy.

How conceptual history changes the analysis

An origo must be identified through the coordinates actually used. Speaker, narrator, character and imagined observer can supply different centres; grammatical forms indicate which one is active.

References for the historical section

Historical source evidence and Atlas applications remain separate; this import does not assert new first attestations or a fresh exhaustive source verification.