[…] the meaning of linguistic forms in any language is known primarily from the circumstances in which they are spoken, and one can use the short-cut of translating them into a second language only to the extent that the second language has roughly similar distinctions between the meanings of its own linguistic forms.
- Harris (1940), a pag.221

The meaning of a linguistic form may best be defined as the range of situations in which that form occurs, or more exactly, it is the features common to all the situations in which the form occurs and excluded from all those in which it does not.
- Harris (1940), a pag.227