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Reference itself captures the relationship between the referent and the word or phrase used by the speaker. For referring expressions, the denotation of the phrase is most likely the phrase's referent. For content words, the denotation of the word can refer to any object, real or imagined, to which the word could be applied. [2]
The philosopher John Stuart Mill was one of the earliest modern advocates of a direct reference theory beginning in 1843. [4] In his A System of Logic Mill introduced a distinction between what he called "connotation" and "denotation". Connotation is a relation between a name (singular or general) and one or more attributes.
Denotation and exemplification are both types of reference. Goodman calls denotation the "core of representation." (5) Something is denoted when it is referred to by a label but does not "possess" it. Exemplification is possession plus reference. "While anything may be denoted, only labels may be exemplified." (57)
"On Denoting" is an essay by Bertrand Russell.It was published in the philosophy journal Mind in 1905. In it, Russell introduces and advocates his theory of denoting phrases, according to which definite descriptions and other "denoting phrases ... never have any meaning in themselves, but every proposition in whose verbal expression they occur has a meaning."
Literal language is the usage of words exactly according to their direct, straightforward, or conventionally accepted meanings: their denotation. Figurative (or non-literal) language is the usage of words in a way that deviates from their conventionally accepted definitions in order to convey a more complex meaning or a heightened effect. [1]
The distinction between denotation and connotation can be made in textual analysis and the existence of dictionaries is used to support the argument that the sign system begins with a simple meaning that is then glossed as new usages are developed.
On this view, definite descriptions like 'the present King of France' do have a denotation (specifically, definite descriptions denote a function from properties to truth values—they are in that sense not syncategorematic, or "incomplete symbols"); but the view retains the essentials of the Russellian analysis, yielding exactly the truth ...
In addition to the singular and plural reference (in many languages grammatically obvious), linguists typically distinguish individual or specific reference, exemplified by each case presented so far, from generic reference, where a singular expression picks out a type of object rather than an individual one, as in The bear is a dangerous animal.