This is only a question of vocabulary, but I would say that $item is a reference to what is commonly called an Array of Hashes (AoH). From a strict technical standpoint, there is not really such thing as an AoH in Perl, the only way to store hashes into an array is to store in the array a list of references to hashes. But this is commonly called array of hashes because that is really the underlying intent of the data structure. The only reason I am making this point is that it might be easier for you to understand the expression Array of Hashes (even though it is a slight abuse of language), rather than array of hash refs, which might make less sense to you.