legisign

Etymology

From legal and sign.

legisign means A sign that consists in a general idea, norm, or law. Lexicurio rates it Sui generis — a strength score of 89 out of 100.

Why “legisign” is a great word

LEGISIGN — [Noun] A sign whose meaning is constituted by a governing convention or rule, such that any instance is understood as an instantiation of that abstract type. From the Latin lēgi-, lēx ("law") and the English sign. Unlike a "qualisign" (a mere potential for appearance, like the quality of redness) or a "sinsign" (a singular, concrete occurrence, like a specific red scratch), a legisign is the governing pattern itself. It is the traffic code that gives authority to the octagon, the syntactic law that animates a sequence of sounds, and the unspoken rule that makes a raised hand a greeting rather than a threat—the silent architecture of significance, without which no particular sign could ever be understood.

noun

A sign that consists in a general idea, norm, or law.“A Rhematic Indexical Legisign [e.g., a demonstrative pronoun] is any general type or law, however established, which requires each instance of it to be really affected by its Object in such a manner as merely to draw attention to that Object. Each Replica of it will be a Rhematic Indexical Sinsign of a peculiar kind. The Interpretant of a Rhematic Indexical Legisign represents it as an Iconic Legi”