natural language A natural language or ordinary language is a language that occurs naturally in a human community by a process of use, repetition, and change. It can take different forms, typically either a spoken language or a sign language. Natural languages ...

, a deferred reference is the metonymic use of an expression to refer to an entity related to the conventional meaning of that expression, but not denoted by it. Several types of deferred reference have been studied in the literature.

Examples

English

The following examples are from (Nunberg 1995): * (server to a co-worker in a deli) ''The ham sandwich'' is at table 7. * (restaurant patron to a valet, indicating a key) ''This'' is parked out back. * ''Yeats'' is still widely read.

References

* * * __NOTOC__ Semantics Metonymy {{semantics-stub