Word.ws English Dictionary

signifer

/ˈsɪɡnɪfə(ɹ)/

signifer adjective: bearing signs.

Adjective

signifer (not comparable)

  1. (obsolete) Bearing signs.
    • the circle called Signifer, or the Zodiake1601, C[aius] Plinius Secundus [i.e., Pliny the Elder], “(please specify |book=I to XXXVII)”, in Philemon Holland, transl., The Historie of the World. Commonly Called, The Naturall Historie of C....

Noun

signifer (plural signifers)

  1. Something that indicates or signifies; a sign, symbol, or codeword.
    • In other words: the advertiser creates a new sign of which the signifier consists of the happy face and the signified can be defined as "using this product makes (you) happy"..1981, Jan Marie Lambert Peters, Pictorial Signs and the Language of Film, page 40
    • Hence the commitment to the primacy of the materiality of the signifier ( to shape ) is also a commitment to the primacy of experience ( to the subject position ) . Because what something looks like must be what it looks like to someone , the appeal to the shape of the signifier is at the same time...2013, Walter Benn Michaels, The Shape of the Signifier: 1967 to the End of History, page 60

Forms of signifer

pluralsignifers

Origin of signifer

From Latin signifer, from signum (“sign”) + ferō (“to bear”).

Questions about signifer

What does signifer mean?
Signifer means bearing signs.
What part of speech is signifer?
Signifer can be an adjective or a noun.
How do you pronounce signifer?
Signifer is pronounced /ˈsɪɡnɪfə(ɹ)/.

Words near signifer in the dictionary

  1. signholder
  2. signholders
  3. signiconic
  4. signieur
  5. signieurs
  6. signifer
  7. signifiable
  8. signifiance
  9. signifiaunce
  10. signific
  11. significance

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: signifer (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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