Coreference
noun ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 The relationship between multiple terms that have a common referent. countable, uncountable
"If we use subscript letters to indicate coreference (so that two NPs with the same subscript refer to the same entity, whereas two NPs with differ- ent subscripts refer to different entities), then we can say that (19) is ambigu- ous as between the two interpretations represented in (20) below: (20) (i) The menᵢ will shoot the arrowsⱼ at each otherⱼ (ii) The menᵢ will shoot the arrowsⱼ at each otherᵢ"
- 2 the grammatical relation between two words that have a common referent wordnet
Example
More examples"If we use subscript letters to indicate coreference (so that two NPs with the same subscript refer to the same entity, whereas two NPs with differ- ent subscripts refer to different entities), then we can say that (19) is ambigu- ous as between the two interpretations represented in (20) below: (20) (i) The menᵢ will shoot the arrowsⱼ at each otherⱼ (ii) The menᵢ will shoot the arrowsⱼ at each otherᵢ"
Etymology
From co- + reference.
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.