SIGNIFICATION

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does signification mean? 

• SIGNIFICATION (noun)
  The noun SIGNIFICATION has 1 sense:

1. the message that is intended or expressed or signified

  Familiarity information: SIGNIFICATION used as a noun is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• SIGNIFICATION (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

The message that is intended or expressed or signified

Classified under:

Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents

Synonyms:

import; meaning; significance; signification

Context example:

the import of his announcement was ambiguous

Hypernyms ("signification" is a kind of...):

content; message; subject matter; substance (what a communication that is about something is about)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "signification"):

lexical meaning (the meaning of a content word that depends on the nonlinguistic concepts it is used to express)

grammatical meaning (the meaning of a word that depends on its role in a sentence; varies with inflectional form)

symbolisation; symbolization (the use of symbols to convey meaning)

sense; signified (the meaning of a word or expression; the way in which a word or expression or situation can be interpreted)

connotation; intension (what you must know in order to determine the reference of an expression)

referent (something referred to; the object of a reference)

burden; core; effect; essence; gist (the central meaning or theme of a speech or literary work)

intent; purport; spirit (the intended meaning of a communication)

lesson; moral (the significance of a story or event)

nicety; nuance; refinement; shade; subtlety (a subtle difference in meaning or opinion or attitude)

overtone ((usually plural) an ulterior implicit meaning or quality)

point (a brief version of the essential meaning of something)

Derivation:

signify (denote or connote)

 Context examples 

I felt the greatest ardour for virtue rise within me, and abhorrence for vice, as far as I understood the signification of those terms, relative as they were, as I applied them, to pleasure and pain alone.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

I was still pondering the signification of Institution, and endeavouring to make out a connection between the first words and the verse of Scripture, when the sound of a cough close behind me made me turn my head.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

I afterwards found that these labours, performed by an invisible hand, greatly astonished them; and once or twice I heard them, on these occasions, utter the words good spirit, wonderful; but I did not then understand the signification of these terms.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)