Walaa jehad abu saqer220102739

Reference and Referring Expressions

“Words themselves do not refer to anything, people refer”

Reference is an act in which a speaker, or writer, uses linguistic forms to enable a listener, or reader, to identify something. These linguistic forms are called referring expressions.

They can be:

(a) proper nouns:

‘Brasília’ ‘Bill Clinton’

They can be:

(b ) ) (noun phrases definite:

‘The city’ ‘The ex-president’

(c ) ) (noun phrases indefinite:

‘A place ’ ‘A man’

They can be:

(d )pronouns:

‘It’ ‘He, him’

Referring expression is any expression used in an

utterance to refer to something or someone, namely used with particular referent in the mind of the speaker.

For example, when I say,“Alice did a presentation last

lecture” “There is no Alice in this class”

Intension and Extension

IntensionIs the set of properties shared by

all members of the extension.

It indicates the internal content of a term or concept that constitutes its formal definition

Intension is unchangeable.

the intension of “ship” as a substantive is “vehicle for conveyance on water”

the intension of “dog” must be an animal that can bark . An image of the word dog would have to be general enough to include the different sizes, shapes, and colors, yet still exclude foxes and wolves.

ExtensionIt is the set of entities which it

denotes.

indicates its range of applicability by naming the particular objects that it denotes.

Extension is changeable

ships

passenger

ships

battleships

cargo ships

sailing ships

Ships

dogs

collies

dachshunds

mongrels

Dalmatians

dogs

prototypeIt is an object or referent that is

considered typical of the whole set.

Culturally and socially dependent.

• Prototypes can vary across populations.

If you encounter to the lexeme bird in isolation and immediately think of robin rather than others, that bird ,for you the prototype of all birds.

But not everybody is likely to have the same prototype for a particular set.

Some different kinds of referents:Unique and non-unique referents

Concert and abstract referents

Countable and non-countable referents

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