Sense and Reference
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Sense
 The relationship inside the language that creates meaning.
 It is related with the complex system of relationship between
one linguistic element with other linguistic elements such as
(word-word, phrase –phrase, etc).
 E.g.
 Every house has got a main bedroom.
 Every –house has different sense with individual word, every
and house
Reference
 The relationships between language and the world
 It deals with the relationship between the language elements
(word, phrase, and clause) and the non linguistic elements
(the world of experience)
 E.g
 William Shakespeare lived in this house
William Shakespeare indicates a person while this house indicates a
thing
Try to determine the reference
 The morning star
 K.H. Abdurrahman Wahid
 The president
 Black board
Sometimes same word have more than
one sense
 1. The bank of Tokyo

The bank of Musi
 2. A mug of milk

He is a famous mug
 3. Hak manusia

Hak sepatu
Analyze the following sentences. Does it have one
sense or more ? How many reference does it
 Luna Maya is engaged to Ariel.
 Buku dijual ibu
 Flying plane is dangerous.
Referring expression
Any expression used in an utterance to
refer to someone or something
 Example:
 Y : “John hit the cat”.

 In this utterance, the name John refers to
someone, while the expression the cat refers a
certain cat. Thus, John and the cat are
referring expression
Type of Referring expression
Definiteness
Definite
Indefinite
Collectiveness
Collective
Distributive
Referring expression can occur in the form
of proper name, noun, or noun phrase.
 Definite referring expressions refer to an
identifiable individual or class (The Dalai Lama; The
Coldstream Guards; the student with the highest marks)
 Indefinite referring expressions allow opportunity
in identifying the referent (a corrupt Member of Parliament;
a cat with black ears - where a is to be interpreted as 'any'
or 'some actual but unspecified').
 Collective reference is the picking out of the members of a set




as a set,
Distributive reference is the picking out of the members of a
set individually.
Compare the examples;
Manchester United won again today (where the reference of
Manchester United is to members of the team as a unit), with
Manchester United wear red shirts and black shorts (where the
reference of Manchester United is to the team members as
individuals).
The difference may not be marked linguistically, but arrived at by
interpretation in context.
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