refer
/rɪˈfəː
/verb (refers, referring, referred)
1 [no object] (refer to) Mention or allude to: her mother never referred to him again the Royal Navy is referred to as the Senior Service...
- Everyone has one or two names and is referred to as the son or daughter of his or her father.
- Cultures treated in this manner are hereafter referred to as washed cells.
- The president of the United States is often referred to as the leader of the free world.
Synonyms
mention, make mention of, make reference to, allude to, touch on, speak of/about, talk of/about, write about, cite, name, comment on, deal with, go into, treat (of), note, point out, call attention to, bring up, raise, broach, introduce
rare advert to, moot
1.1 [with object] (refer someone to) Direct the attention of someone to: I refer my honourable friend to the reply that I gave some moments ago...
- I think my friend has already referred you to what is on page 213, but his Honour said, ‘I'll consider any submission you put.’
- Friends, family and influential colleagues might also refer you to a trustworthy tailor.
- I wrote to Paul (an old colleague) referring him to your article [on dowsing] and he replied.
Synonyms
pass, hand on, send on, transfer, remit, direct, leave, commit, entrust, assign, hand over
1.2 (refer to) (Of a word, phrase, or symbol) describe or denote; have as a referent: the star refers to items which are intended for the advanced learner...
- Words that refer to kinds of things have definitions that describe the essences of those kinds.
- The word itself refers to a method of dyeing designs on cloth by coating with removable wax the parts not to be dyed.
- The word refers to a technique, usually a bomb, not an ideology.
Synonyms
apply to, be relevant to, have relevance to, concern, relate to, belong to, be about, have to do with, be connected with, have reference to, pertain to, appertain to, be pertinent to, have a bearing on, bear on, affect, involve, cover, touch, touch on
archaic regard
denote, describe, indicate, mean, depict, symbolize, signify, designate, stand for, represent
2 [with object] (refer something to) Pass a matter to (a higher body) for a decision: the prisoner may require the Secretary of State to refer his case to the Parole Board...
- We have repeatedly asked the council to refer this matter to an independent body.
- His decision not to refer the matter to the Minister, on the face of the material before the Court, cannot be said to be so unreasonable that no reasonable decision-maker could have made it.
- A decision to refer a matter to the minister depends on its sensitivity, demands on resources, need for a political judgement, and uncertainty about the minister's reactions.
2.1 (refer someone to) Send or direct someone to a medical specialist: she was referred to a clinical psychologist for counselling...
- In addition, all of the participants had various medical conditions, but they were referred to the clinic because of stress-related symptoms.
- A sequence of spots of lights is shown, and you will be asked which ones you can see. If you are found to have glaucoma, you will be referred to an ophthalmologist (specialist eye doctor) for treatment.
- Since then, I have been referred to a specialist rheumatology hospital and have been prescribed many nonsteroidal, anti-inflammatory drugs.
2.2 [no object] (refer to) Read or otherwise use (a source of information) in order to ascertain something; consult: I always refer to a dictionary when I come upon a new word...
- Leddy refers to sources as diverse as Bartok, Darwin and Baudrillard, but essentially it's a send-up.
- The amount of time people spend contending with each other there, quoting articles, and referring to other sources!
- The most difficult part of packing books is deciding which ones I am most likely to want to read or refer to in the near future.
Synonyms
consult, turn to, look at, look up (in), seek information from, search in, have recourse to, call on;
seek advice from, call in, take counsel from, ask
3 [with object] (refer something to) archaic Trace or attribute something to (someone or something) as a cause or source: the God to whom he habitually referred his highest inspirations...
- Unsurprisingly, Gallo refers everything back to his childhood, mining his youth for anecdotes.
3.1Regard something as belonging to (a certain period, place, or class): you went wrong when you referred all legislation to a part of virtue...
- Most people refer the relationship to the Accord period, and the last had Labor governments.
- Bayfield interpreted his specimens as belonging to the coral genus Cyathophyllum, while Meglitsky referred the Siberian specimens to Calamites, a Carboniferous genus of vascular plants.
4 [with object] Fail (a candidate in an examination): twenty-four students passed the prescribed test while four students were referred
Phrases
refer to drawer
Derivatives
referable
/ adjective ...- The second element must be causally referable to the first, which is to say the termination of employment, the retrenchment, must be on account of or as a consequence of the redundancy of position, not some other circumstance.
- Here, Carey compares the fly experiments with data from other taxa whose longevity is summarized and, finally, he comes to make his results and scientific thoughts referable to human longevity.
- An insurance company is exempt from corporation tax on income and chargeable gains in respect of so much of its long term business fund as is referable to pension business - see section 438 ICTA 1988.
referrer
- The search engines provide the glue that binds this blog to a global stream of thought because when you do the sums, I'm getting five times as many people from search engine referrers as I am from hyperlinked daily readers.
- They have convinced the work referrers - local professionals - to refer vulnerable and stressed clients to them by concentrating exclusively on business recovery and insolvency.
- I found this site in my referrers a few days ago and so far I'm enjoying what I've read (thanks for the link, will return the compliment when I get around to revamping my own links page).
Origin
Late Middle English: from Old French referer or Latin referre 'carry back', from re- 'back' + ferre 'bring'.
Refer comes from Latin referre ‘carry back’, from re- ‘back’ and ferre ‘bring’. Referee dates from the early 17th century, but did not appear in sports contexts until the mid 19th century. Referre is also the source of mid 19th-century referendum from the Latin for ‘referring’. Ferre is the source of numerous words in English including confer ‘bring together’; defer ‘put to one side or away’, which shares an origin with differ; fertile ‘bearing’; and transfer ‘carry across’, all of which came into the language in the Late Middle English period.