Deferred reference

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In natural language, 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.

[edit] Examples

[edit] 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.

[edit] Japanese

The following example is a famous linguistic joke.

(in a restaurant, when asked who ordered the eel) I am the eel (僕は鰻だ, boku wa unagi da^?).

[edit] References

Nunberg, Geoffrey (1979). "The non-uniqueness of semantic solutions: Polysemy". Linguistics and Philosophy 3: 143–184. ISSN 0165-0157 OCLC 3127141.
Nunberg, Geoffrey (1995). "Transfers of meaning". Journal of Semantics 12: 109–132. ISSN 1477-4593 ISSN 0167-5133 OCLC 49846877.
Ward, Gregory (2004). "Equatives and deferred reference". Language 80 (2): 262–289. ISSN 0097-8507. Retrieved on 2007-01-19.