A reified symbol throws together the gesture with an aspect of the context, that is an abstract-systematic framework,and in the process comes to represent and refer to it in a way that is identified or fused with the phenomenon being explained as if it were that phenomenon. An example of this is the use of the words ""gravity"" or ""relativity"" in the context of physics. Reified symbols, then, are gestures that point to or stand for, abstract-systematic frameworks of explanation. They represent a reality in an abstract way and then refer to that abstraction as reality. This is what a symbol is usually thought to be but it is a cognitivist definition that identifies the symbol with the word and thus ignores the gesture-response structure and, therefore, the proto and significant forms of symbol.
Abstract-systematic frameworks are constructed in reified symbols and have their own internal rules and procedures for processing and manipulating those symbols. This is true of language in general and ""languages"" specific to disciplines such as mathematics or accounting as well as cultural specific languages of particular organizations.
Stacy, 2001, 108-109)
