Historical Context and Deixis in Literature (Vocabulary Flashcards)

Silk History and Context

Well, worm spit. (Page 5)
Questions about silk:
- 1) When did people start making silk fabric?
- 2) How is silk fabric made?
- (Page 6)
A Brief History of Silk (Page 7)
Spring Silkworms (Chun can) by Mao Dun, 1933 (A synopsis) (Page 8)
Analyzing Literary Texts Using the Historical Context (Page 9)
- Title slide indicating the method; contains related resource links (website/graphic not content)\

Historical Context in Literature

Historical context is an important part of life and literature, and without it, memories, stories, and characters have less meaning. (Page 10)
Historical context deals with the details that surround an occurrence: the social, religious, economic, and political conditions that existed during a certain time and place. (Page 10)
Analyzing the Historical Context of a Story Using Local Colors (Page 11)
- Local colors as a method for historical reading (local cultural details embedded in text).
A historical reading of the text requires going back to the historical events that shape the development of the story. Note the important or significant events at the time the story was written (Gioia & Gwynn, 2020) (Page 12).

Deixis in Literature

Analyzing a short story using Deixis (Page 13)
What is Deixis?
- Deixis refers to words or phrases that cannot be fully understood without context—they point to people, places, or time depending on who is speaking, where, and when. (Page 14)
Deixis in Literature (Page 15)
- Focus on how deixis operates in literary texts (heading with no additional content).
What is Deixis? (Page 16)
- Deictic words are pointers in a text that allow you to identify its time and place.
- Example: “here” and “now” in the sentence “You read this here and now”.
- Spatial deixis: “here”; Temporal deixis: “now”.
What is Deixis? (Page 17)
- Deixis is how we know what a certain class of referential words and expressions actually means when we encounter them.
- Examples include: "I", "you", "now", "today", "here", "there", "next Tuesday", and many others.
Deixis and Narration (Page 18–19)
- All language implicitly comes from some speaker or writer, even the language in your book.
- For a third-person narrative, the source is the anonymous narrator: an imaginary, disembodied placeholder figure who stands in for some actual person telling us the story.
There are three main types of deixis (Page 21)
- Person deixis
- Time deixis
- Place deixis
Person deixis (Page 22)
- Examples: I, you, he, she, we, they
Time deixis (Page 22)
- Examples: now, then, yesterday, today, tomorrow
Place deixis (Page 23)
- Examples: here, there, above, below
Several types in narration, such as time and place deixis (Page 24)
- Possible categorizations:
- Narrator/Character and time
- Narrator/Character and place
Narrator and time (Page 25)
- Time deixis describes the time and sequential order of events in the story.
- Examples: now, then, today, tomorrow, yesterday
Applying Deixis to Narrator and Time in a Short Story (Page 26)
- When analyzing a short story with focus on the narrator and time, use person and time deixis to understand.
Who is telling the story; When the story is being told; How the point of view shapes our understanding (Page 27)
Example to illustrate time deixis (Page 28)
- "I still remember how cold it was that morning. Back then, everything felt different. Now, years later, I can finally understand why it all happened the way it did."
Time deixis analysis details (Page 29)
- "that morning" – specific time in the past
- "back then" – refers to a past period
- "now" – refers to the present time of narration
- "years later" – indicates the time gap between past and present
Narrator and place (Page 30)
- Examining how the narrator's location and spatial references affect the storytelling.
Place deixis (Page 31)
- Place deixis refers to the location of the story; examples: here, there, this place, that place
Applying Deixis to Narrator and Place in a Short Story (Page 32)
- When analyzing a story focusing on narrator and place, ask:
- Where is the narrator located in relation to the events?
- How does the narrator use words like here, there, this, that, near, far, etc.?
- Is the narrator inside the scene (first-hand experience) or outside/remote (observing from a distance)?
Example: "I stood here at the edge of the cliff, watching them disappear down that narrow path below. Behind me, the wind howled through the trees." (Page 34)
Deixis markers in the example (Page 35)
- "here" – indicates the narrator’s current location (edge of the cliff)
- "that narrow path below" – points to a specific place at a distance from the narrator, but visible
- "behind me" – shows direction relative to the narrator
Let's Try! (Page 36)
Practice prompt (Page 37)
- Identify lines from the excerpt of Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe which show the relationship of narrator and time and narrator and place.
- Underline the deictic words/phrases used to describe and reveal time and place.
Thank you very much! (Page 38)

Practice Connections and Concepts

Historical context complements literary analysis by grounding events in the era’s social, religious, economic, and political conditions.
Local colors as a method emphasize culturally specific details that reveal historical context.
Deixis helps readers parse who tells the story, when events occur, and where events take place, shaping interpretation and reliability.
In narration, time deixis anchors events in a timeline (past, present, future) and can reveal narrative distance (time gaps, flashbacks, foreshadowing).
Place deixis anchors scenes spatially, influencing readers’ sense of proximity, perspective, and movement within a story.
When analyzing a text like Things Fall Apart (or any narrative), actively identify deictic markers to understand narrator perspective, temporal sequence, and spatial relations.

Quick Reference: Key Terms and Examples

Deixis: words whose meaning depends on context (speaker, place, time).
Deictic words: I, you, now, today, here, there, next Tuesday, etc.
Temporal deixis: now, then, today, tomorrow, yesterday, years later.
Spatial deixis: here, there, this place, that place, edge of the cliff, etc.
Person deixis: first-person, second-person, third-person references (I, you, he, she, we, they).
Three main types of deixis: Person, Time, Place.
Applications: Determine who is narrating, when the narration occurs, and where the narrator is relative to events to interpret meaning and perspective.

Things to Remember for the Exam

Be able to define deixis and distinguish between its temporal, spatial, and personal forms.
Be able to identify deictic expressions in a short excerpt and explain how they affect narrator-time-place relationships.
Be able to apply deixis analysis to both time and place in a short story, including how the narrator’s location and perspective influence interpretation.
Recognize how historical context and local color contribute to a text’s meaning beyond the surface narrative.
When given a sentence or paragraph, extract deictic markers and explain their function in signaling time, place, and point of view.

Example Revisions

Deixis example from Page 28:
- Sentence: "I still remember how cold it was that morning. Back then, everything felt different. Now, years later, I can finally understand why it all happened the way it did."
- Deictic markers: "that morning" (specific past time), "back then" (past period), "now" (present narration), "years later" (time gap)
Place example from Page 34:
- Sentence: "I stood here at the edge of the cliff, watching them disappear down that narrow path below. Behind me, the wind howled through the trees."
- Deictic markers: "here" (narrator's current location), "that narrow path below" (distant but visible place), "behind me" (direction relative to narrator)

References Mentioned

Gioia & Gwynn, 2020 (Historical context guidance)
Mao Dun, Spring Silkworms (Chun can) – 1933 (A synopsis)
Chinua Achebe, Things Fall Apart (text used for deictic analysis exercise)