referent

B2 Topic:Communication

US /ˈɹɛf(ə)ɹənt/ UK /ˈɹɛf(ə)ɹənt/ See IPA manual

Freq #131115

Meanings

1

noun
The thing in the world that a word or phrase refers to.

In the sentence "the dog barked," the referent is the actual dog.

Thesaurus

Word family

Forms referents

Derived forms nonreferentreferentless

Related forms antecedentcoreferentrefer reference referential referral referrer

Etymology

From refer + -ent.

*bʰer- Proto-Indo-European

View etymology graph ->

Topics

Communication

External links

markdown