Referansetypen

Referansetypen is a term used in several disciplines to denote categories of references or referents. The exact meaning depends on the domain, but the concept generally concerns how expressions or items point to or denote other entities.

In linguistics and philosophy of language, referent types describe the kinds of entities that linguistic expressions can pick out. Common categories include proper names (Knut), definite descriptions (the author of that book), pronouns (she, they) and indexicals (here, now) whose reference depends on context. The study of reference explores how words relate to objects, events or ideas in the world, in possible worlds, or within discourse, and how context determines or constrains that linkage.

In programming and computer science, the related notion often appears as reference types. A reference type is a type whose values are references to objects in memory rather than the objects themselves (in contrast to value types). Characteristics include indirection, potential aliasing, and dynamics through garbage collection in managed languages. Languages differ in how strictly they separate reference types from value types, how they handle null or undefined references, and how equality is defined for references versus the objects they point to. Understanding referencement in this sense helps with concepts such as memory management, polymorphism and mutability.

In bibliographic and academic contexts, some discussions classify_REFERENCES or citations by referenztypen, such as primary sources (original materials), secondary sources (analyses or interpretations), and tertiary sources (summaries or encyclopedic overviews). Other taxonomies may distinguish normative versus informal references, or peer-reviewed versus non-peer-reviewed sources.

Overall, referansetypen describe how references or referents are categorized across domains, reflecting both the nature of what is being referred to and the rules governing the linkage between expression and meaning or memory.