Course on general linguistics
Language/speaking
Separating language from speaking means
Separating what’s social from what’s individual
What’s essential from what’s accessory and what’s accidental
Language is a product assimilated by the individual; speaking is an individual act
Language
A well-defined object in the heterogeneous mass of speech; can be localized in speaking; social side of speech; exist in contract
Can be studied locally, can be reduced*
Speech is heterogeneous, and language is homogeneous.
Language is concrete no less than speaking: linguistic signs, though psychological, are not abstractions; associations are on collective approval and do “sit” in the brain
Semiology
The study of signs
Signification
A linguistic unit is a double entity, one formed by the association of two terms
The linguistic sign units a concept and a sound-image, the psychological imprint of the sound (sensory)
Sign = the whole
Signified = the concept
Referent: the actual cat
Signifier = the sound image
Linguistic value
Value vs signification
Value is one element in the signification, which depends on the value;
values are composed of dissimilar thing that can be exchanged for the thing of which the value is to be determined, and of similar things that can be compared with the thing of which the value is to be determined
Similarly, signification results from comparison, but value content is fixed only by the concurrence of everything that exists outside it.
E.g. The value of a French plural doesn’t coincide with that of a sanskrit plural even though their signification is identical. Thus, value is depending on what’s outside and around it
If words stand for pre-existing concepts, they should all have equivalents in meaning from one language to the other, but no.
E.g. Time: tenses concepts are purely differential and defined not by their positive content but negatively by their relations with the other terms of the system
Language is a system of interdependent terms in which the value of each term results solely from the simultaneous presence of the others
Material value (sounds, writing) are secondary; linguistic signifier is not phonic but incorporeal; writing signs, letters are arbitrary
Values in writing function only through reciprocal opposition within a fixed system that consists of a set number of letters
The means by which the sign is produced does not affect the system
The linguistic sign is arbitrary
Signs used in writing are arbitrary
Value of letters is purely negative and differential
Objection 1: onomatopoeia
But never organic elements of a linguistic system
Not all onomatopoeic words are authentic; limited imitation of certain sounds
Still subject to evolution
Objection 2: interjections
Still assigned not spontaneous
The linear nature of the signifier
A signifier is unfolded auditorily when: 1) it represents a span; 2) the span is measurable in a single dimension; a line
Unlike writings, auditorial signifiers are chains
Axis of simultaneities and axis of successions (AB, CD) in the coordinate plane
Synchrony and diachrony
Synchrony: autonomous and inter-dependent
Like a projection of an object on a plane, the projection depends on the object and differs from it, in linguistics this relationship applies to historical facts and language-state
The traverse cut that shows the arrangement on a particular plane, grasps the relationship between fibers
Diachrony
The longitudinal cut that shows the fibers that constitute the plant
Spontaneous and fortuitous
The signs considered in its totality
Language makes sense by negative differences — conceptual and phonic differences issued from the system
But when considering signifier and signified together, language is positive: the pairing of a certain number of acoustical signs with as many cuts made from the mass of thought engenders a system of values, and this system serves as the effective link between the phonic and psychological elements within each sign, combining to have a positive effect
It’s not absolute arbitrariness, but rather relative arbitrariness
Language is form and not a substance
Q: are cultural symbols arbitrary? What about symbols in collective consciousness / collective unconscious?
Q: how does the correspondence theory of truth argue against this arbitrariness?
Q: is the reality formulated by language or the other way around? Does Saussure need an ontological premise for his argument?
Q: Can Saussure's ideas be effectively applied to other systems of signs, like gestures, fashion, or iconography?
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