Referential Indexes are used when referring to nothing in particular. When
someone is as vague as to refer to nothing in particular while making a statement, they are using a referential index. Easily the most commonly used referential
indexed words are, ‘thing’, ‘it’, ‘stuff’, ‘them’, ‘that’ etc.
Here’s what you may come across…
“I went to visit it and when I got there I couldn’t find that thing.”
“Whenever I talk, I like them.”
“They sure do know a lot of stuff.”
We tend to use these all the time in our communications with others without
every really realizing it (how many other things do we communicate inside or
outside that we’re not aware of yet?). You’ve probably heard something similar to this in the past (or maybe recently)… “He was over there talking about that, and
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then when he came back he started talking about all of this stuff that just made
no sense, and when that thing arrived he ended up just throwing it…”