Personal Deixis Reversal of Balinese Language

This study analyzes the form and use of deixis reversal in Balinese, a regional language that ranks eighth in terms of the speakers number among all regional languages in Indonesia. Research data were from written and oral data. Data were obtained through literature and field study (observation and interviews) by applying elicitation, tapping, recording, and note-taking techniques. The collected data were analyzed using the matching and distributional method. The analysis shows that in Balinese there are six forms of deixis reversal, namely (1) the form of first person to refer to the second person (yang ‘I’ in quoted speech); (2) the form of second person to refer to the first person (bapa 'father, uncle', Pak De, 'Pak De'); (3) the form of first person to refer to the third person (cang 'I' in quoted speech); (4) the form of third person to refer to the first person (I Dayu, I Made, I Mbok); (5) the form of second person to refer to the third person (nyai 'you for women' in quoted speech); and (6) the form of third person to refer to the second person (ida 'your majesty', I Meme 'mother'). The use of deixis reversal is a speaker's communication strategy to create a close relationship with the others; to joke or point it indirectly to make it sound sweet. In deixis reversal, the speaker uses both personal pronoun deixis and personal noun deixis