Referring

How to spell referring

9 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce referring

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does referring mean?

1. verbMentioning or directing attention to something or someone; or sending a person to another source for help or information.

Referring in a sentence

• The manager kept referring to last quarter's figures during the meeting.

• The doctor is referring her to a specialist for further tests.

Where does referring come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This is the present participle of the verb 'refer', which English took from the Latin referre, meaning literally 'to carry back' or 'to bring back', formed from re- 'back' and ferre 'to carry, to bear'. In medieval Latin and then in Old French as 'referer', the sense widened from physically carrying something back to directing attention back to a source or authority. English adopted it in the late 1300s, first in the sense of assigning a matter to someone for a decision, and later in the everyday sense of mentioning or pointing to something. The same ferre root carries (literally) into a whole family of English words such as 'transfer', 'infer' and 'conference'. The spelling trap lives entirely in the ending: because 'refer' stresses its last syllable, the final r doubles when -ing is added, giving 'referring' rather than the wrong 'refering'.

How the word is built

• re- (back)
• fer (Latin ferre: to carry, bring)
• -ring (-ing with doubled r because the stress falls on the final syllable)