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.
Famous quotes containing the word reference:
“In writing these Tales ... at long intervals, I have kept the book-unity always in mind ... with reference to its effect as part of a whole.”
—Edgar Allan Poe (1809–1849)