indexical
1
9.6
- adjective
- /ˌɪndɛkˈsɪkəl/
- Specialized
:
indexical
- The word 'here' is an indexical term because its meaning depends on the speaker's location.
- indexical inference
- indexical marker
- indexical sign
Examples
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And that's because the word here is what philosophers call an indexical, a word whose meaning changes depending on who uses it.
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Art critics habitually recognize both iconic and indexical features in the objects they view.
Academic text (1994) -
Was there ever actually an original indexical moment?
Academic text (1994) -
Yet "youth" itself, as well as the apparently opposed category of "elderly," are indexical categories that include people of diverse ages.
Academic text (2000) -
The same indexical communicative practices are thought to apply to the celestial domain.
Academic text (1990) -
But both interviews and reconstructions draw, in different ways, upon the indexical power of documentary as a cinematic mode.
Academic text (2009) -
Thus, these studies generate preliminary evidence that indexical information may also inform recognition of artificially degraded speech.
Academic text (2012) -
However, Trio A's phraseless, non-hierarchical composition is also a form appropriate to its indexical ambition.
Academic text (1999) -
Equally important is the actual effect of what is said on social reality, the indexical or performative effect, function 2 (F2).
Academic text (1993) -
Some of these co-speech gestures depict things in an iconic (illustrative) or deictic (indexical) way.
Academic text (2013)
How Context-Dependent
Surface Forms
Morphology
Etymology
Indexical comes from the Latin word index, which means 'one who points out' or 'sign' and brings to mind the index finger that points to things. So something indexical acts like a pointer: it directly shows or refers to a particular person, thing, or event.