Reference vs. Substitution: Two Grammatical Cohesion Resources

Why the distinction matters

Reference and substitution are both grammatical resources for creating cohesion, but they do different kinds of work. Both help speakers and writers avoid unnecessary repetition and connect one part of a text to another. The crucial difference is this: reference helps the reader or listener identify the same person, thing, event, or idea, whereas substitution replaces a linguistic item with a shorter form that usually represents a different member of the same class or a repeated structure.

Celce-Murcia and Olshtain (2000) describe reference, substitution, ellipsis, and conjunction as grammatical cohesive ties that operate across clause and sentence boundaries. In their example, Paul bought a pear. He ate it, Paul/he and pear/it are coreferential: each pair points to the same entity. By contrast, in Did Sally buy the blue jacket? No, she bought the red one, one replaces jacket, but the red jacket is not the same jacket as the blue one. The relationship is therefore one of shared classification rather than shared identity (pp. 53–54).

Paltridge (2022) makes the same distinction especially clearly: reference normally involves co-reference, while substitution and ellipsis generally involve some difference between the first item and the second. He also notes that reference can reach much farther back in a text, while substitution usually depends on material in the immediately preceding discourse (pp. 118–129).

Reference: identifying a discourse entity

Reference occurs when an expression cannot be fully interpreted by itself; the reader or listener must retrieve its identity from the surrounding text or situation. Paltridge (2022) identifies anaphoric, cataphoric, exophoric, and other reference patterns (pp. 118–121).

Anaphoric reference points backward:

María submitted the assignment. She uploaded it this morning.

She refers to María, and it refers to the assignment. The second sentence does not replace María or the assignment with new items; it keeps the same discourse participants active.

Cataphoric reference points forward:

Although he was nervous, Daniel began the presentation clearly.

The reader temporarily holds he in memory until Daniel supplies the identity.

Exophoric reference depends on the physical or situational context:

Put that over there*.*

Without seeing the speaker, object, or location, a reader cannot determine what that or there means. Celce-Murcia and Olshtain (2000) distinguish this situational reference from textual reference: this can point to something physically present or to an idea previously mentioned in the discourse (pp. 2–3).

Reference can also extend across several sentences:

A new student joined our class last week. The student is from Oaxaca. Several classmates invited her to lunch. By Friday, she already knew most of the group.

The expressions the student, her, and she form a reference chain that helps the reader track the same participant through the paragraph.

Substitution: replacing wording rather than identifying the same entity

With substitution, a short grammatical form stands in for a noun, verb phrase, or clause. Paltridge (2022) gives three major patterns (pp. 127–128).

Nominal substitution — one/ones

I need a blue marker. Do you have one*?*

Here, one means a marker, but not the same marker already mentioned. Compare:

I bought a blue marker. I put it on my desk.

In the first pair, one is substitution: another member of the category marker. In the second pair, it is reference: the same marker.

Another contrast makes the difference even clearer:

I like the black backpack, but I’ll buy the brown one*.*I like the black backpack. It is on sale.

The brown one is a different backpack; it refers back to the same black backpack.

Verbal substitution — do/does/did/done

A: Did Elena finish the report?B: Yes, she did.

Here, did substitutes for finished the report. The substitute carries the grammatical structure without repeating the full verb phrase.

A: Has he had dinner?B: He must have done.

Paltridge uses this type of example to show how a form of do can substitute for an earlier verb group (2022, p. 127).

Clausal substitution — so/not

A: Do you think the class will be canceled?B: I think so.

So substitutes for the proposition the class will be canceled.

A: Will the exam be postponed?B: Probably not.

Not stands for the negative version of the proposition rather than referring to an object.

A practical diagnostic: same thing or same kind?

A useful way to distinguish the two is to ask:

Does the second expression point to the same entity? → likely reference.Does it replace wording while referring to another example, action, or proposition of the same type? → likely substitution.

Compare:

• Carlos has a laptop. It is new. → reference: same laptop.

• Carlos needs a laptop. He wants a light one*.* → substitution: a laptop of the same class, not a previously identified laptop.

• I read the article, and Ana did too. → substitution: did = read the article.

• I read the article. It was difficult. → reference: it = the same article.

This distinction is important because substitution is not simply “another kind of pronoun.” Celce-Murcia and Olshtain (2000) describe reference as coreferential, whereas substitution such as one is coclassificational: it belongs to the same class but does not have the same referent (p. 53).

Why English language learners may struggle

One difficulty is overusing full nouns because repetition feels safer:

Maria gave the teacher Maria’s paper because Maria wanted the teacher to check Maria’s introduction.

A more natural reference chain would be:

Maria gave the teacher her paper because she wanted him to check her introduction.

The opposite problem is overusing pronouns, creating ambiguous reference:

When Ana spoke to Laura, she said she needed help.

The reader cannot confidently identify the two instances of she. Effective cohesion therefore requires not maximum pronoun use, but a balance between economy and recoverability.

A second difficulty is cross-linguistic transfer. Celce-Murcia and Olshtain (2000) note that languages differ in their preferred cohesive patterns. Their discussion of English and Thai conversational data reports that Thai may favor lexical repetition in contexts where English more often uses ellipsis or referential forms (p. 54). Learners may therefore produce grammatically correct texts that sound unusually repetitive—or, in the opposite direction, may omit or substitute material where English readers expect an explicit noun phrase.

A third difficulty is that forms such as one, do, so, it, this, and that have several grammatical and discourse functions. Learners may know one as a number but not recognize it as a noun substitute, or know do as an auxiliary without noticing its cohesive function. Likewise, this and that may be taught only as demonstratives even though, in extended discourse, they can refer to whole propositions or organize topic development (Paltridge, 2022, pp. 116–118).

Finally, substitution is especially easy to miss because it is strongly associated with interaction. Paltridge (2022) observes that substitution is more common in spoken discourse than in written discourse (p. 127). Learners exposed mainly to textbook prose may therefore understand pronoun reference but have less experience interpreting forms such as one, do, and so in authentic conversation.

Implications for teaching and analysis

For classroom work, learners should compare minimal pairs instead of memorizing definitions:

I bought a new phone. It has a good camera.I need a new phone. I want a cheaper one.

Ask students first to identify what the highlighted form connects to, then decide whether the relationship is same entity or replacement of wording. Next, have them trace reference chains across a paragraph and identify places where full noun phrases are needed to prevent ambiguity. For substitution, authentic dialogues are particularly useful because they show how speakers avoid repeating entire noun phrases, verb groups, and propositions.

The broader lesson is that cohesion is not simply a list of forms. Reference and substitution are choices that help discourse users manage continuity, economy, and recoverability. A successful text gives readers enough linguistic evidence to know whether they should retrieve the same referent or reconstruct an omitted/replaced linguistic structure.

References

Celce-Murcia, M., & Olshtain, E. (2000). Discourse and context in language teaching: A guide for language teachers. Cambridge University Press.

Paltridge, B. (2022). Discourse analysis: An introduction (3rd ed.). Bloomsbury Academic.