Saussure, Structuralism, and Key Concepts in Modern Linguistics
Foundations of 20th-Century Linguistics
Ferdinand de Saussure: The Father of Structuralism
Saussure was a Swiss linguist whose ideas laid the foundation for many significant developments in linguistics in the 20th century. He is considered one of the fathers of 20th-century linguistics. Saussure’s early work was in philology, but he is mainly remembered for his theoretical ideas, as summarized in the Course in General Linguistics.
Course in General Linguistics (Key Text)
The Course in General Linguistics is an influential book compiled by Charles Bally and Albert Sechehaye that is based on notes taken from Ferdinand de Saussure’s lectures at the University of Geneva. It was published posthumously in 1916 and is generally regarded as the starting point of structural linguistics, an approach to linguistics that flourished in Europe and the USA in the first half of the 20th century but is now regarded by professional linguists as outdated.
Saussurean Principles and Concepts
1. Diachrony and Synchrony
- Diachrony: Language as a continually changing medium, focusing on its state at some point in time.
- Synchrony: Sees language as a living whole, existing as a state at a particular moment in time.
2. Language, Langue, and Parole
- Language: A system of signs that express ideas.
- Langue: The abstract system of language that is internalized by a given speech community.
- Parole: The individual acts of speech and the putting into practice of language.
3. The Linguistic Sign: Signified and Signifier
- Signified: The thing signified or concept.
- Signifier: The thing that signifies or sound image. This component is psychological.
4. Syntagmatic and Paradigmatic Relations
Syntagmatic: Analysis of syntax (word order). Paradigmatic: Describes distinct concepts.
Other Key Saussurean Concepts
- Sign: The basic linguistic unit of communication within a community. It has a double identity because it is composed of the signified (concept) and the signifier (sound-image).
- Semiology: The study of signs and sign processes, including indication, designation, likeness, analogy, metaphor, symbolism, and communication.
- Arbitrariness of Sign: There is no natural reason why a particular sign should be attached to a particular concept.
- Compositionality: The meaning of a complex expression is determined by the meaning of its constituent expressions and the rules used to combine them.
- Onomatopoeia: Saussure said that onomatopoeic words can be coincidental. Example: French and English onomatopoeic words for a dog’s bark are ouaf ouaf and bow wow.
- Value: The value of a sign depends on its position and relations in the system of signification and upon the particular codes being used.
American Structuralism
American linguists were concerned with establishing good descriptions of the American Indian languages and cultures before they disappeared.
Leonard Bloomfield and Descriptive Linguistics
Leonard Bloomfield wrote the first major statement synthesizing the theory and practice of linguistic analysis, titled Language. He was called a ‘structuralist’ because of the various kinds of techniques he employed to identify and classify features of sentences into their constituent parts.
Noam Chomsky and Generative Grammar
Chomsky developed the conception of generative grammar: to provide a means of analyzing sentences that took account of this underlying level of structure.
- Surface Structure: The composition of phrases or words.
- Deep Structure: The underlying meaning of each word/sentence.
Chomsky also introduced the distinction between:
- Competence: A person’s knowledge of the rules of a language.
- Performance: The use of a language in a real situation.