という

[fragulistic]

I have been trying to figure out what という　means, I have been seeing it a lot as of late and can't really find a meaning. An example sentence I have seen is,
あなたがこの地を訪れるということは残る。。。。。
Could someone give me an explanation of it?

[aKuMu]

と言う (という)
said - called thus

[clay]

ということ in this case means "means" but you can see that in what Abadoned said, "toiu".

風が強くなったということは嵐が来るかもしれない。
kaze ga tsuyoku natta toiu koto wa arashi ga kuru kamoshirenai.
wind-became stronger-"called thus"/ means-storm-coming-probably
The wind getting stronger must mean a storms a-brewin'.

Clay

[skrhgh3b]

Do you remember a movie by the name of A Fish Called Wanda? Well, という sort of works like that: ワンダという魚。Or, if you imagine that was actually the Japanese title of the film (it's not): もしかして「ワンダという魚」という映画を覚えていますか？ Sorry, that's just a favorite example of mine. ということ is actually an expression, but when you understand という itself, it's very easy to understand what it means. If it helps, you can think of と in Japanese much in the same way you think of quotation marks in English, and it goes without saying いう is the verb 言う。 When you see it in hiragana without its kanji, I suspect there's a good chance it's used in the ワンダという魚 construction:

「Nine Horsesというバンドで、えー、Snow Borne Sorrowというアルバムですね。」 -- Radio Sakamoto Podcasting Vol. 2 12/31/05.