Ferdinand de Saussure’s Structural Linguistics

The idea of language as a system of signs is usually associated with Ferdinand de

Saussure, a Swiss linguist who lived in the latter part of the 19th century and whose
views on language were published posthumously from the lecture notes of his
students. For this reason, Ferdinand de Saussure is usually referred to as “The
Father of Modern Linguistics”. Saussure was a historical linguist who studied the
evolution of sound patterns in the Indo- European languages. Historical linguistics in
the 19th century and earlier was devoted mainly to find out the proto- type (or
mother) languages from which modern languages were thought to have evolved.
This devotion to the past was based on empirically- derived premise that some
languages evolved from the same ancient language.

Diachronic v.s. Synchronic

Saussure came to a point where he became disillusioned with historical linguistics.

Saussure abandoned his historical orientation and, instead, set his sights on the
system of language itself. In other words, while his earlier works focused on the
study of language through time, his new concern dealt with the study of language at
a particular point in time. While earlier he worked on the diachronic aspect of
language, he now started working on its synchronic dimension.

Signifier and Signified

According to Saussure, language is a

system of signs. A sign functions like a
coin with two sides. The first side consists
of the form of the sign. The concept of the
sign, on the other hand, refers to a mental
image which registers in the mind.

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Langue and Parole

- Langue: The structure of the language that is mastered and shared by all its
speakers. It refers about all the rules of the language (grammar, syntax…)
- Parole: It is the individual’s actual speech utterances and writing. It refers to
colloquial (popular) language.

Because Saussure wants us to study language in a systematic, scientific way, it is

therefore understandable that his linguistics would focus on the langue, rather than
the parole. The langue is abstract and is therefore easily systemized. On the other
hand parole is messy, forever changing and therefore extremely difficult to capture in
any scientific investigation.

Syntagmatic and Paradigmatic

Aside from the synchronic and diachronic dimensions of the sign, we can approach
language through its syntagmatic and paradigmatic aspects. These aspects actually
refer to different types of relations that sign can have with one another. On the other
hand, sign relate each other in a syntagmatic way- that is according to their positions
in a given sentence or utterance. On the other hand, signs relate to each other in a
paradigmatic way- that is, according to the membership in particular types or classes
of signs.

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Summary

Language, according to Saussure, is a system of arbitrary signs. A signifier and a

signified constitute a sign which, in turn, has both synchronic/ diachronic and
syntagmatic/ paradigmatic dimensions. The system is both abstract (langue) and
concrete (parole). Since the goal of linguistics is to look for a system in language in a
scientific and empirical way, then the focus of this approach is the langue of
language as well as sign’s synchromatic and syntagmatic dimensions.

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Semiotics - Semiology

Semiotics (from the Greek ‘semeion’) is the study of signs and texts, which is to say
that it is the study of meanings, communication, interpretation and significance.

The terms ‘semiotics’ and ‘semiology’ alike refer to the theory of signs, and
thus to the way in which a study of signs and systems of signs can explicate
problems of meaning and communication. While ‘semiotics’ was coined in the
seventeenth century by the English philosopher John Locke and ‘semiology’ by the
twentieth century linguist Ferdinand de Saussure, the former term is perhaps used
more frequently.

The study of signs can be broadly traced back to ancient Greece, for example in the
medical study of symptoms as signs of disease. Similarly, modern semiotics may
embrace everything that can act as a sign, and which can therefore generate and
communicate meaning. The importance of semiotics for cultural studies lies in the
insight that it can provide into communication within human cultures, and thus with
the artificial (as opposed to natural) processes that make possible human
communication.

Within cultural studies, semiotics may be applied, equally productively, to such

diverse artefacts as literary texts, popular songs, photographs, advertisements, road
signs, food and clothing. Crucially, semiotics therefore allows cultural studies to
break from the evaluative approach of traditional literary criticism and aesthetics, for
it does not seek to assess the worth of texts, but rather to understand the processes
through which they become meaningful and how they are variously interpreted.

What is a sign?

The basic unit of semiotics is the sign. A sign is a unit of meaning. ‘Aliquid pro
aliquo’: a sign is ‘something that stands for something else.’ A sign is something that
‘tells’. It is for this reason that Umberto Eco (‘The Name of the Rose’) defines
semiotics as the discipline that studies lying. Signs are always pretending they are
something else.

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 ➢ Semiosis’ means ‘sign-activity’. It is what signs do. Semiosis is not always
communication.

Sign and text: Signs combine to form Texts. A text can be thought of as a message
recorded in some medium so that it is independent of a sender or a receiver.
Semioticians analyze texts to reveal their hidden meanings - what’s really going on.

Codes: Signs and Texts are governed by codes. Codes are the rules and
conventions for making a text in a given genre or medium. They are also the
environment/context in which signs exist. Codes are what help us understand and
interpret signs. They are the rules of the game. These rules change over time.

A signifying code is a set of culturally recognised rules that guide the way in which a
text may be read. The code will determine the material from which significant units
can be selected and the manner in which selected units can be meaningfully
combined (see syntagm).

Syntagm: In semiotics, a combination of signs, from a paradigm, that constitutes a

meaningful whole. A set of rules or codes will determine the correct and thus
meaningful way in which potentially meaningful units can be combined, in order to
form a syntagm. For example, considered as a syntagm, a European road sign is a
combination of one of a small set of coloured, geometric shapes (such as a red
triangle, a blue circle), with one of a set of silhouettes or more abstract shapes (an
arrow, the silhouette of a motor car).

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Semiology-Saussure

Semiology - a ‘science which studies the role of signs as part of social life.’ Saussure
believed that his linguistic theories could be applied to all communication events.
Semiology assumes that all culture on some level is ‘like a language’.

Semiology

Semiotics, simply put, is the science of signs. Semiology proposes that a great
diversity of our human action and productions--our bodily postures and gestures, the
the social rituals we perform, the clothes we wear, the meals we serve, the buildings
we inhabit--all convey "shared" meanings to members of a particular culture, and so
can be analyzed as signs which function in diverse kinds of signifying systems.
Linguistics (the study of verbal signs and structures) is only one branch of semiotics
but supplies the basic methods and terms which are used in the study of all other
social sign systems (Abrams, p. 170). Major figures include Charles Peirce,
Ferdinand de Saussure, Michel Foucault, Umberto Eco, Gérard Genette, and Roland
Barthes. Language is the dominant model of a sign system for semiotics, and the
linguistics of Saussure has had a major influence on the development of modern
semiotics. At the core of Saussure’s approach to language is the claim that language
(and thus the words or signs within a language) do not merely correspond to a
pre-existing (extralinguistic) reality. Rather, language is seen as constituting the
reality we experience. Thus, the word ‘herb’ does not point to some pre-existing
segment of reality, for the distinction between, say, herbs, flowers and vegetables
depends upon our possessing a language that allows us to recognise differences
between these three types of plant. (We might readily imagine a language that did
not make this distinction, and perhaps then imagine the difficulty we would have in
explaining the difference to someone who did not speak English, even if we were
fluent in this other language.)

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Saussure -Sign

Saussure’s sign has 2 parts; a sound-image (signifier/Sr) and a concept

(signified/Sd). The formal association of these two parts makes a sign. (eg: /tree/ -
‘concept of a tree’) The relationship between the two is formal and psychological.
Signification is something that goes on in our heads.

For example: Upon

seeing the word 'tree',
you immediately
understand what the
word signifies, despite
the fact that the letters E and T and R have nothing to do with the woody, leafy
qualities of a tree. Every signifier is completely arbitrary, having no inherent relation
to the physical world; yet, according to Saussure, signifier and signified simply do not
exist without each other. I cannot imagine a tree without the use of the 'sound-image'
of a tree. I can't conjure up the imagery of a sycamore or birch without the word
(what Saussure calls a sound-image) of ‘tree’, or ‘arbol’ or ‘arbre’ etc. (Saussure
noted 2 exceptions to this rule: onomatopoeia and mathematical notation).

Sign vs. Symbol - According to Saussure, "words are not symbols which
correspond to referents, but rather are 'signs' which are made up of two parts (like
two sides of a sheet of paper, one does not exist without the other, and conversely,
one always implicates the other. They are each other's condition of possibility) A
mark, either written or spoken, called a 'signifier,' and a concept (what is
'thought' when the mark is made), called a 'signified‘.

The arbitrary sign: The relation between signifier and signified is arbitrary. Lots of
languages have different signifiers for the same concepts. As long as everyone
agrees what the signifier is then we can understand each other. The distinction is
important because Saussure contended that the relationship between signifier and
signified is arbitrary; the only way we can distinguish meaning is by difference (one
sign or word differs from another).

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A system of differences: As
a sign is made up of this
arbitrary relationship, it can
only have a meaning to the
extent that it is different from
other signs. Language is a system of differences. What something means is
dependent on how much it differs from other signifiers and signifieds. Language is a
system of formal relationships.

The relational nature of language implied by Saussure's system rejects the concept
that a word/symbol corresponds to an outside object/referent. Instead,
meaning--the interpretation of a sign--can exist only in relationship with other
signs. Selden and Widdowson use the sign system of traffic lights as an example.
The color red, in that system, signifies "stop," even though "there is no natural bond
between red and stop". Meaning is derived entirely through difference, "a system of
opposites and contrasts," e.g., referring back to the traffic lights' example, red's
meaning depends on the fact that it is not green and not amber.

Sign: A sign may be

understood as anything
that stands for, refers to,
or represents something
else. A sign is analysed
into two elements. A signifier is the material form the sign takes, such as a written
word (‘rose’), an object (the stem and flower of a rose), a trademark, photographic
images, scents, colors, and so on. A signified is the abstract concept to which the
signifier points (so that a rose or the image of a rose may signify the idea of love
more adequately than the word ‘love’, giving you, as a sign, what Barthes has called
a ‘‘‘passionified’’ rose’). Signs may be understood as the most important units that
carry and produce meaning in any act of communication. Signs are meaningful due
to their position within a conventional and culturally specific set of rules (or codes)
that govern their use and appropriateness.

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 ➢ Saussure therefore argues that language, as a sign system, works, not
through the simple relationship of its component signs to external objects, but
rather through the relations of similarity and difference that exist between
signs (and thus wholly within language). Part of the meaning of ‘herb’ is that it
is not ‘vegetable’. Similarly, to use a common example, the word ‘man’ in
English means ‘not animal’, ‘not woman’ and ‘not boy’. This may be extended
to suggest that it has further associations, such as ‘not vulnerable’ or ‘not
emotional’. The meaning of the word ‘man’ therefore depends upon the
particular understanding of masculinity that is current in the language-user’s
culture. In Western cultures, ‘white’ is typically associated with positive
emotions and events (hence a white wedding dress). White is therefore not
black, for black is associated with negative emotions and events. In Eastern
cultures, while the opposition of white and black may be retained, the
associations may be reversed. The white is therefore the colour associated
with funerals. The above examples may begin to indicate how semiotics
moves from language, as the model of a sign system, to other forms of sign
system. A person’s choice of clothing, for example, is meaningful. A black
dress is appropriate in certain social contexts, inappropriate in others,
precisely because it communicates a message about the wearer (she is in
mourning; is being formal; so on).

Language and expressions - One consequence of this for semiology is that

language is not just a vehicle for meaning and thought, but is meaning and thought.
Different languages… different thoughts.

Peircean Semiotics

Unlike Saussure, Peirce didn’t focus on language. He was interested in all kinds of
signs, and his system applies equally to bacteria as to humans. Peirce believed that
all thinking and interpretation was the work of signs. (eg: ‘I’ is the sign through which
people represent themselves to the world.) As a logician he wanted to find out not
only how signs happen to behave, but the rules to govern how they must behave.
For Peirce logic and semiotics are exactly the same thing. Like Saussure, Peirce
believed that signs allow coded access to an object, but in Peircean semiotics signs
can be material as well as mental/psychological.

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Peirce's Sign

Peirce defined the sign as ‘something which stands to somebody for something in
some respect or capacity.’ The Peircean sign has 3 parts: (The Theory of Signs)

- Sign/Representamen(S/R)
- Object (O)
- Interpretant (I)

The Sign/Representamen is very much like Saussure’s signifier. It stands for

something and is interpreted. This produces the Interpretant, which is close to
Saussure’s signified. It is what is represented or meant by a sign. Both the
Sign/Representamen and the interpretant together stand for something else: the
Object.

➢ Peirce goes on to argue that signs generate chains of interpretants, which is

to suggest that a sign is not self-evidently or transparently meaningful. Each
reader will generate his or her own interpretation of the sign. The reader is
therefore always separated from the real object by the sign and its
interpretation. However, as the chain of interpretants progresses, Peirce
argues (at least for certain types of sign, such as those used in
communication within the community of scientists) that interpretants (and thus
the reader’s understanding) gradually become more adequate to the object. In

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 effect, the object, outside language, may then be seen to exert pressure on
signs and sign systems. Thus, while different cultures may classify the realm
of plants differently, a practical engagement and study of plants will, for
Peirce, eventually lead the botanist and the cook to distinguish herb from
vegetable, and rosemary from carrot.

Peirce’s semiotics offers one further, useful set of

concepts, in so far as he distinguishes three types of
sign. Symbols are signs that are only conventionally
related to the objects to which they refer. Thus, the
word ‘dog’ has nothing physically or otherwise in
common with real dogs. A flag may signify a nation,
but need be nothing more than an abstract design.
Indices, conversely, have some causal or existential
link to the object. Thus, the stripped bark is an index, because it is caused by the
deer. Smoke is an index of fire. Finally, icons share certain properties with their
object. A map is thus iconic, as are representational paintings and photographs.

Icon, Index and Symbol

- ICON: ‘relation of reason’ An iconic sign resembles its object (eg: a

photograph)
- INDEX: ‘relation of fact’ An indexical sign has some natural/causal connection
with its object. (eg: smoke & fire)
- SYMBOL: ‘relation of cognition’ A symbolic sign relates to its object in a
conventional and arbitrary manner only (eg: language)

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What's the point of semiotics?

- Allows us to see what is hidden in texts.

- Gives us an understanding of the polysemy of communication.
- Reveals just how much of culture we take for granted as natural and
necessary.
- Unifies the study of communication, and makes legitimate the study of things
like pop-culture

Structuralism

Flourishing in the 1960s, structuralism is an approach to literary analysis grounded in

structural linguistic, the science of language. By utilizing the techniques, methods
and vocabulary of linguistic, structuralism offers a scientific view of how we achieve
meaning not only in literary works but also in every form of communication and social
behavior. Structuralism is a way of thinking about the world which is predominantly
concerned with the perceptions and description of structures. At its simplest,
structuralism claims that the nature of every element in any given situation has no
significance by itself, and in fact is determined by all the other elements involved in
that situation. The full significance of any entity cannot be perceived unless and until
it is integrated into the structure of which it forms a part.

Semantic: Study of the vocabulary of a language within a social life, its interpretation
and its laws.

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Denotation: 'Denotation' tends to be described as the definitional, 'literal', 'obvious'
or 'commonsense' meaning of a sign. In the case of linguistic signs, the denotative
meaning is what the dictionary attempts to provide. The term 'connotation' is used to
refer to the socio-cultural and 'personal' associations (ideological, emotional etc.) of
the sign. These are typically related to the interpreter's class, age, gender, ethnicity
and so on. According to an Althusserian reading, when we first learn denotations, we
are also being positioned within ideology by learning dominant connotations at the
same time.

Connotation: Meaning simply the set of associations that a word evokes.

Metonymy: A form of communication in which a part or element is used to stand for

the whole. At its simplest, we speak of the crown, when we refer to the monarch.
However, we also understand many complex texts through metonymy.

Metaphor: Broadly, a trope in which one thing is referred to by a term which literally
describes something else—the term derives from the Greek metaphora, meaning
transfer or carry over.

Assumptions: Structuralists believe that codes, signs and rules govern all human
social and cultural practices, including communication. That communication can

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refers about sports, education, fashion, friendship and others, each is a systematized
combinations of codes (signs) governed by rules.

What is the difference between the Semiotics of Saussure and Peirce?

•Sassure's signifier is often compared to Peirce's sign.

•Saussure's signified is often compared to Peirce’s object.
•For Peirce, however, there is a third element that is necessary for signification to
occur: the interpretant, or the understanding of the relation between signifier and
signified. If for Saussure signifier and signified are like the front and back of a sheet
of paper, then for Peirce there must be a third element: the physical paper itself. This
third element is what he calls the interpretant. Signifier and signified are linked by the
interpretant; signifier only accesses its signified in being interpreted. You might think
of the interpretant as a prism, or a magnifying glass. It focuses our attention on the
relationship between the signifier and signified. I find that this version of semiotics is
best understood when the signifiers are physical objects rather than words.
•For example: Smoke can be a signifier of fire. The interpretant here--the prism that
turns the sight of smoke (Peirce’s sign/Saussure’s signifier) into an understanding
that 'fire is there' (Peirce’s object/Saussure’s signified)--is the understanding of the
physical relationship between smoke and fire.

Simply put: The difference between the two theories boils down to a multi-step,
causal generation of meaning vs. a co-existing generation of meaning. A crude
analogy might be: a child developing into adult self over time (meaning à la Peirce)
vs. the myth of Athena, springing fully formed, a grown woman, from her father’s
head (à la Saussure).
•Peirce mandates that a sign/signifier must be interpreted to exist. A sign/signifier
generates an interpretant, which in turn allows us to access its object/signified.
Resemblance and physical causality are important features in the generation of
meaning in the physical world.
•Saussure, on the other hand, eschews resemblance or causality. In his version of
semiotics, signifier and signified are arbitrarily linked and inseparable. They create
meaning simultaneously, together.

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