[Vocabulary] the usage of stand for

[shikemoku]

Hello. Could someone check the sentence below?

The statue stands for Venus.

I´m not sure whether I can use ″stand for″ here.
OALD defines the phrase as ″to be an abbreviation or symbol of sth″. The statue is obviously not an abbreviation, but can it be taken as symbol?

Thank you in advance.

 

[emsr2d2]

Of those two possibilities, "to be a symbol of something" is the only one it could be. However, that only works if the statue isn't actually a statue of Venus. I'm wondering what it's actually a statue of!

 

[shikemoku]

Thank you emsr2d2,

The statue I wrote about is the statue of the Milo de Venus.
According to what I read, the statue might not be that of Venus.
It is said we can't tell whether it is a statue of Venus or not, if we don't know what the statue has in its hand(Venus should have an apple in her hand).
But the Milo de Venus doesn't have arms.

 

[Tdol]

It doesn't work for me.

 

[shikemoku]

Thank you, Tdol,

I can´t tell why, buy the sentence doesn't sound right to me, either. What about the sentence below?

The statue stands for peace.

This sentence sounds right to me, maybe because in this case the statue is a symbol of peace. Am I right ?

 

[Tdol]

That works better, but something like symbolises would work better for me.

 

[GoesStation]

Or represents.

 

[emsr2d2]

It's called the Venus de Milo, by the way.

 

[GoesStation]

This thread's title should have been The usage of "stand for"​. Always mark words you're discussing by surrounding them in quotation marks or, in the body of a post, setting them in italics.