A pragmatic and discourse study of common deixis used by Yemeni-Arab preachers in friday Islamic sermons at Yemeni mosques

Abstract

The usage of deixis in sermons, especially in Islam, has been understudied. This study investigated deixis in Friday sermons by Muslim preachers in Yemen using pragmatics and discourse analysis. The shape, purpose, feature, and frequency of the three main categories of deixis (personal, spatial, and temporal) were analyzed. The researcher translated 65 Yemeni-Arab sermons into English from offline and internet sources. Qualitative and quantitative methods were employed in the study. The results showed that these three forms of deixis were often found in each corpus, with the personal type predominating and pointing to many context-dependent referents. Preachers employed deixis to structure discourse and for pragmatic reasons. Deictic terms were employed to engage listeners and structure discourse.

Keywords:

• Yemeni Arabic
• Friday sermon
• discourse analysis
• personal deixis
• spatial deixis
• temporal deixis
• pragmatics

Public Interest Statement

This article uses pragmatics and discourse analysis to study Yemeni Muslim preachers’ Friday sermons on deixis. This is achieved by using qualitative and quantitative research design methods. Each corpus had these three types of deixis, with the personal type predominating and referring to many context-dependent referents. The findings revealed that these three deixes were often found in each corpus, with the personal type predominating and pointing to many context-dependent referents. Preachers used deixis to structure their discourses and for pragmatic reasons.

1. Introduction

Every natural language uses a linguistic phenomenon known as deixis to refer to objects in context (Levinson et al., 1983). It explores the relationship between language and context by looking at how language encodes utterance context and how deictics interpretation is influenced by context. (Barron et al., 2017; Levinson, 2000; Levinson et al., 1983). It contains language forms that denote people (e.g., you and they), time (e.g., yesterday and tomorrow), or place (e.g., here and there). Because it reflects the inevitable intersection and interaction between linguistic form and the context in which speech or talk takes place, notably how participants encode and decode this phenomenon, the study of deixis is crucial to linguistic research, especially pragmatics and discourse studies (Al-Azzawi & Obayes, 2021; Ismail, 2021).

There are several deictic statements in different languages, where context is key to understanding their meaning (Crystal, 2011; O’Keeffe et al., 2011). Context as a constantly changing environment allows interlocutors to interact and clarify deictic use, giving it pragmatic meaning. Deictic expressions are not always deictic. Thus a differentiation must be made (Pradita, 2021). Some expressions can be deictic or non-deictic, depending on context.

An expression is deictic if it takes some of its meaning or interpretation from the current social situation (Abdulameer & Suhair, 2019; Al-Azzawi & Obayes, 2021; Aubali & Ahmad, 2015; Barron et al., 2017; Galib et al., 2022; Horn & Ward, 2008; Khalili, 2017; Levinson et al., 1983; O’Keeffe et al., 2011; Pradita, 2021; Reichelt, 2017). If the expression is context-sensitive, it is deictic. “I couldn’t meet him yesterday, but today is wonderful” is deictic since it refers to a certain moment. Yet, they are non-deictics in “yesterday’s events are today’s inspiration” since they do not refer to a specific period but to the past and present, respectively. Pronoun use is similar. “Ali feels he is well” refers to the noun phrase “Ali” described earlier. Since “he” is anaphoric to the preceding noun phrase, it is unnecessary to identify the speech event to understand what it means. Non-deictic pronoun usage is used here. Although some phrases can fulfil both functions, there is a clear distinction between deictic and non-deictic (anaphoric) phrases. Deictic expressions are typically context-dependent, whereas non-deictic expressions are context-independent.

Two facts demonstrate the relevance of Deixis in Arabic, in particular, and language study, in general. First, based on massive corpus studies, deixis is prevalent and ubiquitous in all languages (Wu, 2004). Second, deixis has been studied across genres, languages, and theoretical perspectives. To put it another way, Arab linguists and grammarians have not studied the concept of deixis as a whole; it appears in several places, such as pronouns, demonstratives, verbs, adverbs, and particles. When describing these grammatical aspects, the Arab grammarian casually mentions the concept of Deixis (Aubali & Ahmad, 2015). Religious deixis has received very little attention over the years. Amidst a thorough literature search in the same field, we have not found a study that addresses Deixis in Islamic Friday sermons, especially in the Yemeni Arab context. As a result, the topic has not received enough attention. This study tries to close this gap by investigating deixis from a pragmatics and discourse analysis perspective as Arab preachers utilize it in Islamic Friday sermons. The results should advance the body of knowledge by bringing academic focus to this field of study and fostering a deeper comprehension of deixis in sermons. It helps future studies. Unlike other studies that concentrated on pragmatic or semantic deixis use, this study combines pragmatics with discourse analysis based on a researcher-compiled corpus. In this way, the following research questions will be addressed throughout the paper:

1. Which varieties of deixis are most frequently utilized in by Yemeni Arab preachers in Islamic Friday sermons?

2. What types of deictic expressions are utilized by each category?

3. What do these deictic types do?

2. Literature review

2.1. Deixis taxonomy

Numerous unique varieties of deictics have been recognized and categorized in the study that has been done. According to Levinson et al. (1983), the classic triad classification of deixis consists of a person, time, and location, which might be represented as “I-now-here.” A broad description of those deictic kinds is described in this section.

2.2. Person deixis

“I” and “we” are pronouns that fall under the concept of person deixis, which is concerned with the identity of the interlocutors in a communication situation (Birner, 2012). Its purpose is to encode the participants’ roles in the setting in which an utterance is produced (Levinson et al., 1983; Liu & Guo, 2016). That is, it is a reflection of the speaker’s point of view on the role of the participants (speakers and hearers) in a speech situation, as well as the role of non-participants in the speech situation other than the speaker and the addressee, (Bogdanowska-Jakubowska, 2021).

One can differentiate between inclusive and exclusive use of certain pronouns based on their clusivity (Wieczorek, 2014). The concept of inclusivity refers to whether or not the addressee is intended to be included in the scope of the pronoun “we,” as expressed by the speaker’s utterance. The expression “we” is said to be inclusive when it is used in a way that includes both the speaker and the addressee; on the other hand, it is said to be exclusive when it includes only the speaker and not the addressee.

2.3. Time deixis (temporal)

Expressions such as “now” and “today” are examples of time deixis. These terms are used to point out and encode the relationship between the interlocutors and the moment the statement is made (Laurence & Ward Gregory, 2006; Levinson et al., 1983). In English, time deixis is primarily grammaticalized through time adverbs and tenses. Examples of time adverbs include now and then (e.g., present and past). According to Levinson et al. (1983), tone is one of the main factors that ensures that almost all utterances are semantically attached to their particular contexts.

The (CT) coding time, or the moment an utterance is made, is known as the speaking time; the receiving time, or the moment an utterance is made, is known as the (RT) receiving time. The focus is primarily on the speaker, whereas the latter focuses on the person being addressed. O’Keeffe et al. (2011) contend that CT and RT are equivalent since most communicative activities naturally occur face-to-face. To be more specific, the representation of CT is done in the present tense because the time the utterance is made in the present time (Liu & Guo, 2016). The past tense refers to events that took place before the coding time. The future tense is used when referring to events that will take place after the coding time. In distality, two temporal deictic forms can be distinguished: proximal and distal. A time that is proximal to the speaker, such as “now,” is referred to as “proximal time,” while a time that is distal to the speaker, such as “then,” is referred to as “distal time.” According to Kermer (2016), the distal form of a verb is the past tense, while the proximal form is the present tense of the same verb.

2.4. Place deixis (spatial)

Including demonstratives (such as this and that), place adverbs (such as here and there), and prepositions of place (such as below and behind), spatial deixis identifies the relationship of interlocutors with referents in terms of location or space in context.

Spatial deictics, like the speaker’s position, are relative to the deictic center. Distance from the center is often measured as proximal/distant. “Here” alludes to a location near the speaker, while “there” is further away. Spatial deixis can be used metaphorically to convey the speaker’s emotional or personal attitude (Liu & Guo, 2016). Yule (2020) shows that a speaker may classify a perfume he just sniffed as symbolically distant by saying, “I don’t like that,” despite being close.

3. Previous studies

Scholars and linguists have studied deixis from diverse perspectives, languages, and genres. In this section, we outline pertinent previous investigations.

Many deixis studies focus on political discourse. Zupnik (1994) argues that analyzing deixis in such a discourse shows the strength of deictics in achieving social goals. Khalifa (2018) and Hutagalung (2017) analyze Trump’s deictic language. While the former illustrates that “we” is typically used to involve citizens in protecting America, the latter, Khalifa (2018), indicates that it is used to express power and domination. Speaking boldly on behalf of his people to an international audience and persuading them to share the burden of duty are just two of the multiple purposes for the word “we” in presidential speeches in Nigeria.

Pragmatic research has been done on deixis. Hanks (2011) asserts that deictic expressions specify where linguistic structure and social circumstances converge. According to Bara (2011) and Marmaridou (2000), deixis is the most transparent language-context interaction. It is the line separating pragmatics from semantics. Time and person deixis are investigated by Haverkate (1992) as mitigating social techniques. The relevance of deixis to the interpersonal aspect of news discourse is highlighted by Bednarek and Caple (2012) and Chovanec (2014). In a speech event, deixis clarifies, confirms, and alters the participants’ interpersonal relationships in speech events.

Research on discourse analysis has looked at Deixis (Al-Khalidy & Odeh, 2019; La Cruz Díaz-Valdés & Daniel de, 2017; Eragbe & Yakubu, 2015; Garner, 2007; Grenoble, 1998; Khaliq & María Isabel Maldonado, 2019; Maziad, 2019; Menshawy, 2020). According to these studies, deixis serves as a discourse strategy for text cohesion and coherence, particularly for signaling and controlling text flow. They also examine how they might be rhetorically used to express ideologies and power structures.

Pronouns and demonstratives are the subjects of some studies. In both English and Japanese, Irgens (2017) found that personal deixis refers to objects, entities, distance/proximity, honorifics, and salience. Wu (2004) examines the core definitions, usage, and extended and metaphorical interpretations of spatial English and Chinese demonstratives. The inclusive “we” is used to describe, elucidate, and critique community viewpoints in Harwood’s (2005) study.

Newspapers, academic publications, literary works, and advertisements have all examined Deixis (Christopher, 2012; Sušinskienė, 2013). Very few studies look at deixis in religious situations (Abdulameer & Suhair, 2019; Inčiuraitė-Noreikienė, 2012; Stapleton, 2017; Yadin-Israel, 2015). The language of Islamic Friday sermons has been examined by several academics (Al Abbad et al., 2019; Abdulameer & Suhair, 2019; Adam, 2017; Alenezi, 2019; Alwan et al., 2014; Azijah & Ingatan, 2020; Jamil & MAHMOOD Tala’a, 2015; Mahmood & Kasim, 2019, 2021; Rumman, 2019; Xinin & Xiaolan, 2021). In fact, after a thorough literature assessment, we could not find any studies that addressed the topic of Deixis in Friday sermons, revealing that the topic is understudied.

4. Islamic Friday sermons

The weekly oral speech (khutba) given by a preacher at mosques is known as the Friday sermon. The sermons aim to help listeners develop positive relationships with Allah and acquire, reinforce, and change particular attitudes and concepts with Allah (Islamic God). The Friday sermon is an influential and informative part of public speech geared toward Muslims (Mahmood & Kasim, 2019, 2021). Religion is a vital and influential force in society and culture. Thus, scholars have examined its language (mostly discourse analysis and pragmatics; Akhimien & Farotimi, 2018; Downes, 2010; Ivanova, 2016). Throughout history and various cultures, sermons have been a significant religious discourse. They have unique structures, functions, and features that make them intriguing to study from a linguistic perspective (Akhimien & Farotimi, 2018). Less consideration has been given to language use in mosques and places of worship where Muslims can pray, receive religious instruction (especially Friday sermons), and socialize with other Muslims (Alkhawaldeh, 2022; Alsaawi, 2017; Rumman, 2019).

Islam’s impact on culture and society justifies interest in Islamic sermons. They have been spread through social media networks, and the rising number of Muslim converts worldwide, particularly in Arabic-speaking countries. Deixis is a fundamental component of discourse, so it makes sense to study it because we think it can help us understand language better (Wu, 2004). It also helps us understand how language behaves in the discourse in question (Green, 1992, 2020). Using corpus data, this study seeks to examine the use of deictic in Arabic Islamic sermons. This study is distinctive because it uses a particular corpus and an eclectic approach to discourse and pragmatics to examine deixis in sermons.

5. Research method

By the time the present study ended, a corpus of 65 sermons had been established. The majority of these sermons were chosen from a corpus that was initially bigger and contained 110 sermons that were gathered from various online and offline sources. All the sermons were delivered initially in Arabic before being translated into English because this study focuses on Friday’s Arabic sermons. They were conducted in various mosques on different Fridays by different preachers. This ensured the data’s representativeness and validity by diversifying themes under scrutiny. Each combined sermon was between 35 and 45 minutes long. Some were recorded by the researcher while listening to the Friday sermons in various mosques located in the major cities of the northern part of Yemen, such as Sana’a, Mahweet, Hajjah, Dhamar, Ibb, and Taiz. Some were downloaded from websites on the internet devoted to Islamic affairs and run by well-known Yemeni Islamic centers and institutions.

The process started with locating all of the instances of the deictic terms present in the corpus by Levinson et al. (1983) framework to analyze the current corpus. This phase included grouping them into their corresponding types (person, time, and place), counting the frequency of each expression and its corresponding deictic type, and identifying which were the most prevalent. Each kind’s occurrences were individually evaluated and interpreted to account for their differences. Along with the works mentioned in this article, Levinson et al. (1983) were also a major source of inspiration for analyzing the pragmatic element. On the other hand, because there is no prior framework on this aspect of deixis, the examination of the discourse role of deixis mainly relies on it (Yule, 2020). According to Wu (2004), context is a core concept in discourse analysis and pragmatics. Thus, it is necessary to analyze deictics because deictic expressions use their context to access their reference, function, and feature.

6. Findings and discussion

6.1. Person deixis

Person deixis, concerned with the individuals taking part in the act of speech, is the first deictic category to be looked into as part of this inquiry. The examination of the sermons showed that the preachers positioned themselves as the deixis’s central focus. Therefore, the interpretation of pronouns must be understood in light of this reference point. The results showed three different kinds of personal deictics in the corpus. These were “We,” “you,” and “I.” The speaker or a group of speakers is referred to by person deixis (I, we). The addressee or a group of addressees is referred to in the second person deixis (you). They can all be multiple or singular, depending on the participant’s involvement in the directed utterance and the recipient. This is in line with the conclusions of several studies, including Adegoju (2014); Ivanova (2016); Kaewrungruang and Yaoharee (2018); and Maziad (2019), which identified those pronouns as being used most frequently in personal deixis. Table 1 shows personal deictics ranked second in the corpus. Personal deictics occur 139 times out of 316. “We” is used 85 times more than “you” (26 occurrences) and “I” (28 occurrences).

Table 1. The occurrences of the Personal Deixis

Person Deixis
We	You	I	Total
85	26	28	139

WeIt has been argued that “we” is referentially complicated, not categorical, and cannot be interpreted without reference to a speech context and the speaker’s intention (Levinson et al., 1983). Despite being used the most frequently in the corpus, the analysis showed that the deictic “we” was used to point to various referents (85 occurrences). The preacher and audience, all Muslims, and all humanity (a general “we” that refers to all humanity) were among these referents. This shows that when the word “we” is used, it is not always clear who is referred to (Garzone & Sarangi, 2008).

When “we” was carefully examined in each instance, its exclusivity and inclusiveness were clear. The pragmatic idea of clusivity reinforced this result. In the study of deixis, this element of the deictic “we” has been highlighted by (Helmbrecht, 2002; Wieczorek, 2014; O’Keeffe et al., 2011l; Marmaridou, 2000). The inclusive “we” excluded the congregation from the deictic center, even though the preacher and congregation are both anchored to it. The statistical results, however, showed that the deictic “we” is used much more frequently (73 occurrences) to serve an inclusive function than its counterpart (12 occurrences), which highlighted the preachers’ preference for the inclusive “we” over the exclusive “we.” In this context, three different groups of people were referred to by the deictic “we”: first, the preacher and the audience; second, all Muslims, including the speaker and the audience; and third, all people. Because it is an exclusive term, it was only ever used to refer to the preacher himself, as well as Muslim scholars and Islamic organizations. This makes it evident that depending on whether or not the addressee(s) are excluded or if inclusion is whole or partial, “we” serves many various deictic references across the corpus. Thus, it is possible to say that the preacher’s use of “we” fluctuated noticeably between an all-inclusive “we” (referring to all of humankind), a more limited, partially inclusive “we” (referring to him and the crowd), as well as an exclusive “we” (referring only to the preacher).

(1) We need to keep working on strengthening the connection with our creator.

(2) We advocated for increased sincerity in the fight against terrorists and terrorism.

When examples (1) and (2) are considered, example (1) indicates that the deictic was used in a way that included both the speaker and the audience. In example 2, the preacher employed the deictic to convey how his organization works to alert the public about terrorists and terrorism. However, he used it to exclude the addressee and made him seem self-centered by talking only about his institution.

(3) We should obey the commandments that Allah has given us and stay away from the things that He has forbidden.

(4) We ought to denounce the violent actions carried out in the name of Islam by extremists.

(5) We beseech Allah to facilitate our journey through this first stage and to save us on the last stage so that we may serve Him with joy.

The fact that the deictic “we” was used so frequently in the data shows that preachers depended extensively on it to achieve various aims, as will be described further below. To effectively convey their message, preachers are expected to employ a variety of persuasive and pragmatic linguistic strategies. One of these tools is person deixis, which is most frequently used with the deictic pronoun. “We” Person deixis is recognized as a crucial rhetorical device that contributes significantly to persuasion (Ivanova, 2016; Zupnik, 1994). This can be observed in Example 3, where the preacher employed the collective deictic “we” to convince the audience that everyone has to uphold Islamic teachings. In other words, it emphasized social duty over individual responsibility to the sermon’s message and Islamic beliefs. As opposed to “you” and “I,” Brown et al. (1987) contend that “we” can play pragmatic roles of positive politeness if, as in example (4), its use lessens the forcefulness of what the preacher wants the audience to do because he is not issuing orders. In contrast to “you” and “I,” the deictic “we” can achieve pragmatic, positive politeness goals, as in example (4), where its use lowers the coercive power of what the preacher wants the audience to do by making it clear that he is pleading with them rather than giving them instructions. Another justification for the frequent use of the inclusive deictic “we” is this. Haverkate (1992) makes the point that the inclusive use of “we” provide some mitigating effects to avoid the perception that the speaker is forcing his point of view on his addressees, which Brown et al. (1987) point out. This function is highlighted by the fact that “we” is used inclusively.

Specifically with the deontic modals “should” and “ought to,” as seen in examples (3) and (4), the inclusive deictic “we” was found in the corpus to co-occur with exhortative assertions to urge listeners to do something that the speaker preached about (4). Additionally, it was used to direct speech acts during supplication prayers in all circumstances, as demonstrated by the example in (5).

(6) We, ourselves, have a responsibility to keep together in mind our responsibilities to our country.

The preacher in example 6 reduced the distance between himself and his audience by using the inclusive “we,” signifying that they were all a part of the same group. As a result, the audience felt a sense of belonging and was more motivated to pay attention to the lessons. Using the word “ourselves” in the illustration, the preacher could also convey a sense of equality with the audience rather than superiority (6). The preacher’s frequent use of “we” can be understood as a proximization strategy to strengthen the audience members’ connection to him. “We,” which helps avoid self-centeredness, is used in place of “I,” which provides the discourse with a marker of self-centeredness. This is especially true when the word “together” is included because it strengthens the connotation of inclusivity or plurality.

(7) In the most recent khutbah, we spoke to discuss the position of the Prophet’s close relatives and companions.

(8) Before he passed away, we mentioned the things that he had emphasized.

I refer to the “preaching we” as another use of the inclusive we. It serves a similar purpose to the “authorial we,” which is another application of the inclusive we (Wales, 1996). By employing “we” instead of the first person singular “I” in examples (7) and (8), the preacher blurred the barrier between speaker and addressee and engaged his congregation in the task being done, as well as drawing their attention to the sermon’s content. Such strategies are seen as rhetorical devices for persuasive goals when used to expressly or implicitly engage the audience. Speakers utilize it to capture their listeners’ attention, include them in the discourse, keep it focused, and guide them to the desired interpretation (Hyland, 2005). It is important to note that “we” frequently appears in sermons with verbs that denote “speaking,” such as “spoke” in example (7) and “mentioned” in example (8).

(9) Since the beginning of natural disasters like drought, we and Islamic ulama (scholars) have declared Fatwas urging all Muslims to comply with the government’s efforts.

In example (9), the preacher presents himself as a representative of an institution by using the exclusive deictic “we.” The context of the sentence demonstrates this. This institutional “we” sought a higher authority to support the fatawa’s “verdict” on taking preventative measures against the drought, as one of the natural disasters, the preacher taking full responsibility for the problem. “We” can be used as a persuasive device to persuade audience members to concur with the suggested course of action since the speaker speaks on behalf of the authoritative source (Arminen, 2017). According to Van Leeuwen (2007), 2008, Leeuwen (1995), referencing reliable sources (in this case, Islamic institutions, represented by the use of “we” standing as reliable sources qualified to issue fatwa) in the immediate context of the current speech aids in legitimizing and strengthening the speaker’s position, winning the support or acceptance of the addressees, and this a discourse legitimation tactic.

7. You

In contrast to Abdulameer and Suhair’s (2019) study, which claims that the personal deictic “you” is the most prevalent in its religious data, our investigation discovered that it is the least common of the personal deictics (26 times out of 139). It is plausible to use this fact to defend the low frequency of “you” because preachers frequently preferred “we” over “you” while addressing the congregation. Because employing the deictic “you” could be perceived as the preacher preaching to his congregation in a superior manner, most of the preachers in the corpus appeared to avoid doing so. Additionally, it promoted a feeling of unity and intimacy among the congregation, which made it easier for them to participate in the communicative event at a deeper level.

(10) I’m going to have a conversation with you about a collection of ayat.

(11) You should look to Aishah as an example because she sided with her husband.

On the other hand, the investigation found that some preachers employed “you” as a discursive tactic to grab the congregation’s attention and provide the impression that the message was personalized for them. When the audience is addressed directly, the deictic “you” can be used in specific instances, like in examples (10) and (11), to express a sense of proximity and lessen the physical distance between the speaker and the listener (Wang et al., 2017), and make the speech’s overall tone more relaxed (Dahnilsyah, 2017; Reyes, 2011).

The assembly that attended the Friday sermon is referred to as “you” in the corpus in a pragmatic manner. The person or people to who the address is directed is referred to as “you” semantically. However, if we know the context, we can tell whether “you” refers to a singular or plural noun. For instance, it is uncommon for Islamic sermons to be addressed to a single person. It is reasonable to expect that there will not be any instances of the singular “you” being found since our understanding of the context tells us that Islamic sermons are meant to be delivered to the entire audience rather than to a single person (Alenezi, 2019). For example, it was a cryptic reference to the entire audience present for the Friday sermon (10). There was only one use of the deictic “you,” and it was employed to address a specific audience subgroup. As an exception, consider this. As can be seen in example 11, the speaker addresses the female crowd as “you” to persuade them to use Aishah, the Prophet Muhammad’s wife, as a model for how to treat their husbands.

(12) What is your situation like with other people? Do you take care of the ill and assist those in need?

To persuade and convince listeners to accept what is being preached to them, “you” has been seen to be utilized in positive semantic prosody. The results revealed that “you” was frequently used when advising to grab listeners’ attention and confirm their interest in the message being delivered, as demonstrated in the example below: (12).

(13) As you surely know, to accuse someone of Zina (adultery) in Islam, four witnesses are required.

The pragmatic marker “you know” is another notable instance of “you” that can be found in the corpus. According to Vanda and Péter (2011), the expression “you know” is used as a discourse device to suggest that the preacher and his listeners have come to a consensus on the message they are delivering and that everyone—not just those who share his viewpoint—is a part of this understanding. Example (13), which exemplifies the point, shows how this is done.

IBecause it only pertained to the preacher speaking to the audience that was overhearing him, the “I” example was the clearest when compared to other deictics in the corpus.

(14) I want to draw attention to a few crucial life lessons that can be considered from the Covid 19 pandemic.

The findings demonstrated that “I,” despite appearing in 28 occurrences in the corpus, served various purposes. The speaker would employ this technique to convey the sermon’s main message to the congregation to spark their interest. The preacher frequently used “I” to illustrate the sermon’s point, as seen in example (14), and these justifications can be found throughout the corpus. The sermons always begin with these justifications.

(15) I was taken aback by her untimely passing.

(16) I don’t think it’s good to share your problems with your friends.

The deictic “I” was also employed in the corpus to indicate to the audience that the preacher was speaking from a specific or personal standpoint and expressing his thoughts or sentiments, as seen in examples (15) and (16). The text’s use of “I” makes this clear (16). Findings from Yadin-Israel (2015) and Bramley (2001) support this use of the personal deictic “I.” It helped the audience to distinguish between the speaker’s ideas or subjective statements and what they presented as Islamic facts. Therefore, Packard et al. (2018) and Wilson (1990) say that “I” encodes a “personal voice.” Additionally, the preacher’s message was more powerful and engaging due to the use of “I” when delivering personal information to listeners. This also helped to forge a closer bond between the preacher and those in the audience. Using verbs like “think” and “mean” in his sermons, the preacher gives the idea that he is communicating intimately. These verbs highlight that the speaker offers a personal viewpoint rather than a set of religious rules.

(17) I make supplication to Allah for the strengthening of our bonds of brotherhood.

At the end of the discourse, which was the last time the deictic “I” appeared in the corpus, the speaker intended to make dua’a (supplication), which can be interpreted as prayer. This is demonstrated in Example 17, which can be taken as evidence that the sermon is concluding.

8. Time deixis (temporal)

Because it provides a focal point to which time indicators (tenses and time adverbs) are associated, the idea of the deictic center is essential to the analysis of temporal deixis. Temporal deictics were the most frequent (149 cases) of the three categories. They emerged in the sample in two ways: grammatically as prepositional phrases and lexically as temporal expressions akin to adverbs (tense such as present and past). This finding is in line with the studies examined by Rühlemann (2018), Barron et al. (2017), and Chovanec (2014).

The preachers and the addressees had the same temporal and spatial context when the sermons were delivered orally and face-to-face. Due to the monologue nature of the Friday sermon discourse in Islam, the research showed no change in the deictic center between the interlocutors as speakers (no change in turns). This was because people present were not allowed to chat, interrupt, or create any other kind of commotion while the preacher spoke. According to this theory, the RT (reception time) and CT (coding time) co-occur. This phenomenon is referred to as “deictic simultaneity.”

As indicated in Table 2, the deictics “today” (61 times) and “now” (20 times) were widely employed in the corpus, making up more than half of all temporal lexical deictics (149 times). They both came from the present tense, suggesting that Friday sermons had the propensity to use deictics that alluded to the present tense more frequently than they did to the past or future.

Table 2. The Occurrences of the Time Deixis

Time Deixis
Today	Now	Other Temporal Lexical Deixis	Total
61	20	68	149

(18) Today we will look at some of the inspiring narratives mentioned in the Holy Quran.

Because Friday was the sole day of the week on which Muslims were obligated to deliver Friday sermons as part of their religious requirements, the word “today” was employed deictically in the corpus to refer to the day on which the sermon was delivered. This sermon was delivered on Friday. The study found that all of the sermons utilized the word “today” as a kind of discourse to introduce the sermon’s subject matter, especially at the beginning of the sermon, as seen in example (18). When discussing speech acts, the words “today” and “now” are frequently associated with both representative and commissive speech acts. The sermon’s topic was told in advance to the assembly, and the preacher agreed to stay on topic.

(19) I’m going to explain what I mean by “disbelief” right now.

When referring to the moment of the preacher’s statement in the sermon, the word “now” is used deictically to allude to the point in time. The speaker in the preceding example (19) used the word “now” to convey the temporal proximity of the explanation while describing what he meant by “disbelief.” Using the term “now,” the speaker could convince his listeners that this “disbelief” would be interpreted quickly. Additionally, it supplied temporal information, which supported discourse connectivity between the text unit containing the word “now” and the text unit or units that were to come and express the anticipated justification.

(20) During the previous lesson, we discussed the Prophet’s relatives’ status. Today, I’d like to spend some time talking about Ali bin Abi Talib.

Two objectives were achieved by including the past deictic “last week” in the corpus. It described the period of the previous sermon as an event that took place in the past and was situated temporally before the coding time. The second objective was to keep the conversation going between the previous sermon—indicated by the distal deictic “last Friday”—and the current sermon—indicated by the proximal deictic “today.” In example (20), the preacher informed the congregation that the subjects of the prior sermon and the current sermon were closely related, the former sermon concentrating on companions in general and the latter speech focusing especially on one of the Prophet’s companions. The preacher informed the crowd that the previous sermon’s topic and the topic of the current sermon were closely related. Furthermore, by referring to the prior topic as “last week,” the speaker intended to draw the congregation’s attention to it. He then related it to the present sermon’s topic and introduced it to the congregation with the deictic “today.”

Additionally, the tense was utilized 68 times in the sermons to transmit temporal deixis, which implied the idea of reference by placing acts and situations in time using grammar. It is believed that tense is a particular form of temporal deixis that necessitates the existence of a specific time point. From this point, we can establish a temporal relationship that considers simultaneity, anteriority, and posterity with the deictic center (Abdulameer & Suhair, 2019). This tense discussion was handled from a deixis standpoint to provide a more precise interpretation of the passage’s time implications. Because temporal deixis must refer to a specific period that is relevant to the circumstance, using the present tense to refer to a general time frame, for example, is not considered deictic (Chovanec, 2014).

Based on the findings, the corpus comprised writing samples in all three tenses: present, future, and past. The present tense implies that the events being discussed occur at or around the time being discussed. In contrast, the use of the future and past tenses suggests that the events occur at or are far distant from the discussed period (Barron et al., 2017). The deictic tense was used in three distinct temporal zones in the sermons: the past (before the time of an utterance), the present (during the time of an utterance), and the future (after the time of an utterance).

(21) I described how the Qura’an contributed to deepening our convictions during one of my lectures two years ago.

A defining characteristic of the tense is that it occurs with time adverbs like “now” and “ago,” as demonstrated in the example (21). This served to bring the listeners’ attention to the period being discussed and to underline the period and reference point to which the tense belonged. The audience was made aware that the event in the issue happened in the past rather than the present by employing time adverbs with the past tense, as in the example (21).

Temporal deictics can be categorized as proximal or distal depending on how near they are to the present Chovanec (2014). The first expression refers to a relatively recent period, whereas the second refers to a period more distant from the period in which the sermon was produced. Generally speaking, the choice of tense impacted the temporal distance between the preacher and his audience and the distance between the preacher and the events.

(22) Her neighbors had taken his money away to compel him to get back and follow their religion after he left for AlMadina (it is now a city in KSA).

In example (22), the use of past perfect denoted a reference to a time even further in the past than the time encoded by simple past. The preacher could distinguish between two distinct eras by referring to a period that was later in the past than the time the event occurred in the narrative.

(23) We have already said that Allah wants the best for us.

Despite being fairly uncommon in the corpus, the present perfect tense was used to denote a time close to the moment the speaker spoke. It also raised the event’s current relevance for the listener when the speaker made the statement, as Chovanec (2014) noted. Example 23 illustrates the present perfect by alluding to an event that happened earlier in the lecture but can also happen at any point throughout the sermon.

(24) next week, we’ll concentrate on yet another incredible event.

(25) As a reward, Allah will grant us eternal life in the last stage.

Future deictics had a minimal presence because the sermons focused primarily on issues that are happening now rather than in the future. When the future tense in the corpus was examined more closely, it was revealed that most of the time, it referred to events that would occur in the near or immediate future, which was very close to the time the statement was made. As shown in example number 24, at the end of the sermon, the subject of the following sermon was revealed and announced using future time. Additionally, it was found to be utilized to highlight the rewards that await one in paradise when talking about the afterlife, as demonstrated in the example (25). As a result, two-time frames were provided by using the future: the first is the most recent time frame, as illustrated in example (24), and the second is the most distant time frame (25).

The preacher frequently used present deictics to place events in the current reference time frame. This choice appears to have been driven by pragmatic considerations. The preacher attempted to focus both his and the audience’s attention on what was occurring in modern Muslims’ lives during this shared temporal anchoring between preacher and congregation. Chovanec’s (2014) findings that the present tense has a strong interpersonal orientation are supported by this finding, which agrees with it. It facilitated establishing interpersonal contact with the congregation by indicating that we were physically present at the same time as them. It also underlined the importance of the sermon’s subject matter, emphasizing the need for it to include topics that are directly related to and current for the Muslim community. To be more precise, the deictic usage of “now” and “today” highlighted the sermon’s temporally close connection to Muslim reality and circumstances, underlining the urgency of reacting to the sermon’s lessons. Furthermore, it indicated that sermon topics were relevant and appropriate to the current life rather than hypothetical or abstract. It consequently affected the perspectives of those who were hearing the sermons. This suggests that current concerns and happenings rather than historical events were the focus of the Friday sermons.

9. Place deixis (spatial)

The deictic expressions used to refer to certain places are covered in this section (e.g., rooms, streets, cities, etc.). They reveal the speaker’s location in space or how they relate to nearby things (Marmaridou, 2000). The quantitative analysis shown in Table 3 revealed just three spatial deictics in the corpus: “here” (13 occurrences), “this” (11 occurrences), and “that” (4 occurrences). There was not a single instance of directional deictics (such as “this way” and “next street”) being used, even though they were all locational. Because the preachers and listeners did not move from their initial location and did not move to another location, the speaker’s position was considered static rather than dynamic. As a result, there was no indication that the deictic center had shifted. Motion verbs like “go” and “come,” which were regarded as deictics in the literature (Levinson et al., 1983), were not utilized at all in the corpus because the preacher discursively positioned himself and the audience at the same deictic center. This might be because spatial sermon centers are static. After all, the preacher discursively positioned himself and the congregation at the same deictic center. Contrary to Wu (2004), this area had a much higher quantitative prevalence of proximal deictics.

Table 3. The Occurrences of the Place Deixis

Place Deixis
Here	This	That	Total
13	11	4	28

The fact that the preacher and the audience were in the same room means that “this” (11 times) was preferred over the distant “that” (4 times). On the other hand, the language representation of an action carried out by one person while another is present forms the cognitive foundation of spatial deictic allusions. This prefers pleasant connections with action that is nearby and occurring right now over action that is farther away and occurring there (Cramer, 2010).

HereAccording to the study, the word “here” can refer to various places and things, including the mosque and Yemen. Most of its occurrences were in mosques, where the sermons were held.

(26) We are here to discuss our duties to our parents.

It appears that the preachers chose the word “here” because the pragmatics of the context led the addressees or listeners to interpret “here” as referring to a specific location. This is because the referent was recognized in context. In the preceding example (26), the pragmatically apparent deictic reference of “here” was the mosque. The preacher assumed that the congregation was aware of the point of reference “here,” which deictically referred to the mosque, where they had gathered. All instances of “here” in the corpus included deictically the speaker’s location at CT (coding time). In contrast, all instances of “there” were distal from the location of both the speaker and the addressee at CT. Because the CT and RC (the receiving time) in sermons occur simultaneously, what was proximal to the preacher’s location was also proximal to the addressee’s location, and vice versa.

(27) We’ve been here for a long time.

The term “here” in example (27) referred to a specific area close to the speaker’s location that was convenient for both the speaker and the audience. It was strongly dependent on the preacher’s location in CT. Practical considerations led to the area’s construction to accommodate both the speaker and the CT attendees. Since “here” may have been referring to the mosque, the city, or the country, for example, the deictic reference was ambiguous and could only be fully understood by considering both the language context and the pragmatic environment (Alsaif & Ahmed, 2011; Wu, 2004). The word “here” in Example 27 cannot be interpreted to refer to the mosque because Muslims have historically used mosques as places of worship rather than homes. We were able to determine that the referent of “here” is Yemen based on the linguistic context of the entire sermon. This is because the entire sermon from which the example was taken focuses on Muslims’ responsibilities in Yemeni society.

(28) Our gathering here is to talk about one of the Prophet’s most notable companions.

Since “here” was a proximity-signaling deictic, it was utilized pragmatically to imply that its use also served to signal an emotional and a close physical distance (Ariel, 2014). The speaker made his argument in the previous case (28), pointing out that since one Muslim community shared a temple, the close closeness implied by the semantic value of the term “here” was physical and emotional. In this sense, the word “here” emphasized the preacher’s proximity and intimacy with the audience while also conveying the preacher’s emotional reaction to the mosque, which was the location to which “here” deictically alluded. In other words, “here” emphasized the proximity and intimacy between the preacher and the congregation. This was due to the mosque’s particular place in Muslims’ hearts. It is noteworthy that the mosque was frequently referred to when the word “here” was used. To introduce his subject and focus the congregation’s attention on his upcoming remarks, the preacher commonly used the word “here” at the opening of his sermons.

(29) Here, the virus is causing chaos in humanity as a whole.

“Here” can be used to denote a point in discourse. In the corpus, “here” indicates an abstract position in discourse. In example (29), the preacher used “here” metaphorically to refer to an abstract place in his stream of thought. The insight stored in the previous utterance was indexed by the word “Here.” This instructed the listeners to link the information from the prior utterance to the information from the upcoming utterance. This usage seemed to have a deictic aim and had the effect of grabbing the listeners’ attention. By connecting one proposition to another, demonstrative phrases like the word “here” are believed to index textual entities and improve the coherence and cohesion of a discourse. This goes along with the assertion by Galib et al. (2022) and Wu (2004).

10. This and that

Compared to the other types of deictics found in the corpus, demonstratives were used only infrequently in sermons. The corpus only contained singular forms of demonstratives, such as “this” and “that,” which can be distinguished by the opposition of distal and proximal. The analysis demonstrates that “this” and “that” were used in deictic contexts from the views of the speaker and his audience because they were all present in the exact physical location (the mosque served as the deictic center) at the same time. While “that” represented directionality away from the preacher’s location in the congregation, “this” indicated physical proximity to the preacher. It is important to stress that the sermons’ spatial perspective was constant and unchanging. The proximal “this” was associated with the vast majority of the deictic demonstratives found in the corpus, whereas the distal “that” was only found in a few cases. However, it is shown “that” occurs substantially more often than its proximal equivalent in Wu (2004). “This” is because the former happens in a variety of structural contexts, whereas the latter does not.

(30) This is not the first time we have warned about the dangers of religious extremism in this mosque.

(31) The righteous in this district is not increasing as a result of some bad deeds committed.

With the help of the proximal “this” in the example, the listeners could correctly identify the referent physically close to them (30). The sermon’s goal was to draw the congregation’s attention to religious extremism, which mosque congregants termed the proximal “this” that had been warned about repeatedly. In the preceding example (31), the preacher used “this” to demonstrate to the congregation that the righteous Muslim people did not reside in the speaker and listeners’ districts compared to other Yemenis.

(32) We must choose whether to go this way or that.

(33) This religion is the source of all compassion and fairness in the world.

The words “this” and “that” are occasionally used in the corpus to refer to what Lyons (1977) and Fillmore (1997) call “emphatic deixis” and “acknowledging functions,” respectively. The preacher used the proximal deictic “this” to refer to the path Muslims should take, which is the path of believers, and the distal deictic “that” to refer to the path taken by unbelievers. Example 32 illustrates this. The word “that” was used to encourage Muslims to avert and avoid the path of non-believers, whereas “this” was used to emphasize that Muslims should follow and be close to the path of believers. As a result, we can deduce that “this” was associated with things valued, whereas “that” was associated with things despised.

Instead of indicating an actual distance between the two points of reference, the preacher prefers to use the metaphors of “this” and “that” to send and implant a message in the hearers’ minds. This is in line with Levinson et al. (1983) finding that changing from “this” to “that” conveys emotional distance while changing from “that” to “this” conveys empathy for the referent.

In the preceding instance (33), it was evident from the context that “this religion” referred to the faith that the congregation members practiced, which was Islam. The word “this” was used in the phrase “this religion” in a deictic manner to imply a close relationship between the speaker and the audience. It was not intended to make it simpler to refer to the religion, which is Islam; rather, it was supposed to convey a favorable opinion of it and show how emotionally close Islam is to Muslims’ hearts and minds. This was explicitly the intended outcome.

(34) The last few days of his life will be the topic of our conversation. There are several reasons for that.

The findings highlighted that deictic demonstratives were also used as a discourse method in the ongoing discourse to organize and coordinate the information flow. They were designed to bring the addressees’ focus to a new discourse element or a new facet of a subject that had been brought up earlier. As in Wu (2004), the deictic pronouns “this” and “that” were used to direct the audience’s attention to specific sections of text. The authors used phrases like “listen to what comes next” and “I’m referring to what was just said” to accomplish this. Example (34) shows that the word “that” refers to the sentence’s meaning. This use acted as a pointing device, drawing the audience’s attention to a particular piece of the text while also enhancing the text’s coherence. Because it is believed that a text can be represented as a place, this discourse function emerged. This function is based on the notion that each utterance in a text has its spatial location (Yang, 2011).

11. Conclusion

The research investigated how Yemeni preachers utilized deixis in their Friday sermons through the lens of pragmatics and discourse analysis. In order to evaluate three different deictic classes, both an online and an offline corpus were implemented. The three categories of deixis, namely person, time, and place, were found frequently in the corpus and displayed various pragmatic and discourse characteristics. Within the context, each of them presented a unique argument. They served a number of different purposes, both discursive and practical, as powerful tools in the preaching process. They influenced the audience by drawing their attention to the sermon’s message, including them in what was being discussed, organizing the material, and ensuring that it remained coherent. They were utilized functionally to communicate courtesy in addition to closeness and intimacy. Only “we,” “I,” and “you” were allowed to be used as deictic pronouns in this sentence. Even though its function of being exclusive occurs more frequently, “we” demonstrated that its inclusive and exclusive characteristics occur more frequently. It is possible to make adjustments that would reduce aggressiveness while simultaneously cultivating a sense of unity and connection. The speaker approached the topic from a human rather than a religious point of view. By establishing a relationship with the listener through the use of the deictic that is used the least, “you,” the conversation was made more casual.

Deictics tended to be temporal in form. They were both lexically (for instance, “today”) and grammatically realized (tense such as present and past). While the word “today” was used to introduce the sermon’s subject, the term “now” preserved the discourse connection between the text unit that was being discussed and the textual unit(s) that provided the anticipated justification. Preaching uses the deictic tense to refer to the past, present, and future.

The corpus contained only three spatial deictics (“here,” “this,” and “that”). “Here” signified a turning point in the conversation. Proximal “this” and distal “that” are metaphorical expressions for feelings or attitudes. They managed and organized the information flow of the dialogue. This discourse function assumes that each syllable in a text is geographically distinct.

Because of the small corpus, the study’s conclusions cannot be considered comprehensive or final. A larger corpus could enable us to understand Deixis in Islamic sermons. This study intends to pave the way for future linguistic research on deixis in different languages and religions to shed light on sermonic deictics.

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No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The authors received no direct funding for this research.

Notes on contributors

Ali Mohammed Saleh Al-Hamzi

Ali Mohammed Saleh Al-Hamzi has a Master of Humanities in Linguistics and is now working on his Ph.D. in Translation. He currently has a position as a lecturer in the Department of English Language within the Faculty of Education at Sana’a University in Yemen. He has a combined twenty years of experience in teaching and research. His research interests include translation, critical discourse analysis, sociolinguistics, pragmatics, and applied linguistics, among other areas; however, this list is not exhaustive.