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The denotative meaning of a signifier is intended to communicate the objective semantic content of the represented thing. So, in the case of a lexical word, say "book", the intention is to do no more than describe the physical object.
Denotation is contrasted with other aspects of meaning including connotation. For instance, the word "warm" may evoke calmness, coziness, or kindness (as in the warmth of someone's personality) but these associations are not part of the word's denotation. Similarly, an expression's denotation is separate from pragmatic inferences it may trigger.
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 referencing just their conventionally accepted definitions [ 1 ] [ 2 ] - in order to convey a more complex ...
An extensional definition gives meaning to a term by specifying its extension, that is, every object that falls under the definition of the term in question.. For example, an extensional definition of the term "nation of the world" might be given by listing all of the nations of the world, or by giving some other means of recognizing the members of the corresponding class.
To coin a word to refer to a thing, the community must agree on a simple meaning (a denotative meaning) within their language, but that word can transmit that meaning only within the language's grammatical structures and codes. Codes also represent the values of the culture, and are able to add new shades of connotation to every aspect of life.
Alternatively, the connotation of the word may be thought of as the set of all its possible referents (as opposed to merely the actual ones). A word's denotation is the collection of things it refers to; its connotation is what it implies about the things it is used to refer to (a second level of meanings is termed connotative). The connotation ...
French semiotician Roland Barthes used signs to explain the concept of connotation—cultural meanings attached to words—and denotation—literal or explicit meanings of words. [2] Without Saussure's breakdown of signs into signified and signifier, however, these semioticians would not have had anything to base their concepts on.
Denotation, in other words, is a semantically inert property, in this view. Whereas Frege held that there were two distinct parts (or aspects) of the meaning of every term, phrase, or sentence (its sense and reference : Sinn and Bedeutung ), Russell explicitly rejects the notion of sense ( Sinn ), and gives several arguments against it.