Reference meaning

a remark that calls attention to something or someone

“she made frequent mention of her promotion”

“there was no mention of it”

a short note recognizing a source of information or of a quoted passage

“the student's essay failed to list several important citations”

“the acknowledgments are usually printed at the front of a book”

an indicator that orients you generally

“it is used as a reference for comparing the heating and the electrical energy involved”

a book to which you can refer for authoritative facts

“he contributed articles to the basic reference work on that topic”

a formal recommendation by a former employer to a potential future employer describing the person's qualifications and dependability

“requests for character references are all too often answered evasively”

the most direct or specific meaning of a word or expression; the class of objects that an expression refers to

“the extension of `satellite of Mars' is the set containing only Demos and Phobos”

the act of referring or consulting

“reference to an encyclopedia produced the answer”

a publication (or a passage from a publication) that is referred to

“he carried an armful of references back to his desk”

“he spent hours looking for the source of that quotation”

(computer science) the code that identifies where a piece of information is stored

the relation between a word or phrase and the object or idea it refers to

“he argued that reference is a consequence of conditioned reflexes”

refer to

“he referenced his colleagues' work”