meaning

(mē'nĭng)
n.

1. Something that is conveyed or signified; sense or significance.
2. Something that one wishes to convey, especially by language: The writer's meaning was obscured by his convoluted prose.
3. An interpreted goal, intent, or end: "The central meaning of his pontificate is to restore papal authority" (Conor Cruise O'Brien).
4. Inner significance: "But who can comprehend the meaning of the voice of the city?" (O. Henry).

adj.

1. Full of meaning; expressive.
2. Disposed or intended in a specified manner. Often used in combination: a well-meaning fellow; ill-meaning intentions.

SYNONYMS   meaning, acceptation, import, sense, significance, signification. These nouns refer to the idea conveyed by something, such as a word, action, gesture, or situation: Synonyms are words with the same or nearly the same meaning. In one of its acceptations value is a technical term in music. The import of his statement is ambiguous. The term anthropometry has only one sense. The significance of a green traffic light is widely understood. Linguists have determined the hieroglyphics' signification.

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noun

1. That which is signified by a word or expression: acceptation, connotation, denotation, import, intent, message, purport, sense, significance, significancy, signification, value. See meaning.
2. The thread or current of thought uniting or occurring in all the elements of a text or discourse: aim, burden², drift, intent, purport, substance, tendency, tenor, thrust. See meaning.
3. What one intends to do or achieve: aim, ambition, design, end, goal, intent, intention, mark, object, objective, point, purpose, target, view, why. Idioms: end in view, why and wherefore. See planned/unplanned, purpose/purposelessness.
4. The gist of a specific action or situation: idea, import, point, purport, significance, significancy. See meaning.

adjective

Effectively conveying meaning, feeling, or mood: eloquent, expressive, meaningful, significant. See express, show/hide.

Whatever it is that makes what would otherwise be mere sounds and inscriptions into instruments of communication and understanding. The philosophical problem is to demystify this power, and to relate it to what we know of ourselves and the world. Contributions to this study include the theory of speech acts, and the investigation of communication and the relationship between words and ideas, and words and the world. For particular problems see content, ideas, indeterminacy of translation, inscrutability of reference, language, predication, reference, rule-following, semantics, translation, and the topics referred to under headings associated with logic. The loss of confidence in determinate meaning (‘every decoding is another encoding’) is an element common both to postmodernist uncertainties in the theory of criticism, and to the analytic tradition that follows writers such as Quine.

Quotes:

"For a large class of cases -- though not for all -- in which we employ the word meaning it can be defined thus: the meaning of a word is its use in the language." - Ludwig Wittgenstein

"All meanings, we know, depend on the key of interpretation." - George Eliot

For a list of words related to meaning, see:

• Enlightenment, Truth, and the Unknowable - meaning: intent and significance of something; reason for being

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Dansk (Danish)
n. - betydning, betydningsindhold, mening
adj. - udtryksfuld, sigende, betydningsfuld

Nederlands (Dutch)
betekenis, bedoeling, veelbetekenend

Français (French)
n. - sens, signification, (Jur) termes (de la loi)
adj. - significatif

Deutsch (German)
n. - Bedeutung, Sinn
adj. - bedeutungsvoll

Ελληνική (Greek)
n. - έννοια, νόημα, σημασία, σκοπός, λόγος
adj. - εκφραστικός, μεστός νοήματος

Italiano (Italian)
senso, significativo

Português (Portuguese)
n. - sentido (m), intenção (f)
adj. - intencional, significativo

Русский (Russian)
значение, многозначительный, существенный, имеющий намерение

Español (Spanish)
n. - intención, propósito, significado, acepción
adj. - significativo, lleno de intención

Svenska (Swedish)
n. - mening, innebörd, avsikt
adj. - menande

中文（简体）(Chinese (Simplified))
意思, 意义, 重要性, 含义, 意味深长的

中文（繁體）(Chinese (Traditional))
n. - 意思, 意義, 重要性, 含義
adj. - 意味深長的

한국어 (Korean)
n. - 뜻, 중요함
adj. - 의미가 있는, ~할 의도가 있는, 선의의

日本語 (Japanese)
n. - 意味, 考え, 目的, 効力, 重要性
adj. - 意味深長な, 意味ありげな, …する考えの

العربيه (Arabic)
‏(الاسم) معنى, مدلول, مغزى, قصد‏

עברית (Hebrew)
n. - ‮משמעות, כוונה, מובן‬
adj. - ‮רב-הבעה, רב-משמעות‬

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