mention

B1 · Intermediate Countable noun

n. a short comment or notice about someone or something.

n. a brief or casual reference to something or someone.

“The book includes a brief mention of the author's childhood in Italy.”

“The CEO made a special mention of the marketing team's efforts during the annual general meeting.”

B2 · Upper Intermediate Countable noun Computing Informal

n. a notification you get when someone uses your name or handle on social media.

n. an instance of a user's handle or name being tagged in a post or reply on a social media platform. Often used in the plural.

“I woke up to dozens of mentions on Twitter after my post went viral.”

“The brand's social media manager spent the morning responding to customer mentions and addressing technical complaints.”

C2 · Proficiency Linguistics Academic · Technical

v. to use a word just to talk about the word itself, not what it means.

v. to utter or write an expression to refer to the expression itself rather than its referent. Often contrasted with 'use' in linguistic philosophy.

“In the sentence 'Apple has five letters', you mention the word 'apple' instead of using it.”

“The philosopher argued that the distinction between use and mention is crucial for avoiding logical fallacies in formal semantics.”