Ferdinand de Saussure was a Swiss linguist who taught at the University of Geneva from 1901-1913. He published his lectures as the influential book Course in General Linguistics in 1916. In this book, Saussure introduced key concepts of linguistics, such as the linguistic sign consisting of the signifier and signified. He argued that language is a system of signs defined by social convention and relationships within the system, rather than a naming system. Saussure's work established linguistics as a distinct scientific discipline and was highly influential in the development of 20th century linguistic theory and structuralism.

1. Ferdinand
Mongin de
Saussure
COURSE IN GENERAL LINGUISTICS

2. Ferdinand de Saussure
•26 November 1857 –
•22 February 1913

3. Ferdinand de Saussure
•professor at the
University of Geneva
(1901-13)

4. Ferdinand de Saussure
•widely considered
one of the founders
of 20th-century
linguistics and one of
two major founders
(together with
Charles Sanders
Peirce) of
semiotics/semiology

5. Ruqaiya Hasan argues that "the impact of
Saussure’s theory of the linguistic sign has
been such that modern linguists and their
theories have since been positioned by
reference to him: they are known as pre-
Saussurean, Saussurean, anti-Saussurean,
post-Saussurean, or non-Saussure".

7. COURSE IN GENERAL LINGUSITICS
(COURS DE LINGUISTIQUE GENERALE)
• A compilation of his lecture notes
by Saussure’s former students –
Charles Bally and Albert
Sechehaye.
• Published at Lausanne and Paris in
1916.

8. "It became arguably the most
influential work of linguistics of the
twentieth century, and can be
considered the foundation stone of
structuralism."
- Giulio Lepschy

10. Characteristics of Language:
1) Language is a well-defined object in
the heterogeneous mass of speech
facts.
- localized in the limited segment of
the speaking-circuit where an auditory
imagebecomes associated with a
concept

11. Characteristics of Language:
- socialside of speech, outside the
individual who can never create nor
modify it by himself; it exists only by
virtue of a sort of contract signed by
the members of a community

12. Characteristics of Language:
- moreover, the individual must always
serve an apprenticeship in order to
learn the functioning of language; a
child assimilates it only gradually.

13. 2) Language, unlike speaking, is
something that we can
study separately. We
can dispense with the other
elements of speech; indeed, the
science of language is possible
only if the other elements are
excluded.

14. 3) Whereas speech is
heterogeneous, language, as
defined, is
homogeneous. It is a
system of signs in which the only
essential thing is the union of
meanings and sound-images, and
in which both parts of the sign are
psychological.

15. 4) Language is concrete
- Linguistic signs, though basically
psychological, are not
abstractions;
- associations are realities that
have their seat in the brain.

16. Besides, linguistic signs are
tangible; it is possible to reduce
them to conventional written
symbols, whereas it would be
impossible to provide detailed
photographs of acts of speaking

17. In language, on the contrary, there
is only the sound-image, and the
latter can be translated into a
fixed visual image.
- language is a storehouse of
sound-images, and writing is the
tangible form of those images.

18. LANGUAGE AS A SOCIAL
INSTITUTION
A System of signs that express ideas, and therefore
comparable to a system of writing, the alphabet of deaf-
mutes, symbolic rites, polite formulas, military signals,
etc.

19. SEMIOLOGY (from Greek SEMEION = SIGN)
•Science that
studies the life of
signs within
society

20. SEMIOLOGY (from Greek SEMEION = SIGN)
•- will show what
constitutes signs
and what laws
govern them

21. SEMIOLOGY (from Greek SEMEION = SIGN)
•Linguistics is only
part of this

22. LANGUAGE
•Not just a “name-
giving” system

23. SIGN IS SOCIAL
•Cannot just be
studied as a sign
mechanism in the
INDIVIDUAL

24. Saussure’ideas on linguistics
I: THE NATURE OF THE
LINGUISTIC SIGN
Language - based on a NAMING
process, by which things get
associated with a word or name.

26. - Assumes that ready-made ideas exist
before words
- Does not indicate if the name is vocal
or psychological in nature
- assumes that this linking is a very
simple process

27. “Linguistic sign unites,
NOT a thing and a
name, but a concept
and a sound-image.”

29. The linguistic SIGN (a key word) is
made of the union of a concept
and a sound image.
A more common way to define a
linguistic SIGN is that a SIGN is the
combination of a SIGNIFIER and a
SIGNIFIED. Saussure says the
sound image is the SIGNIFIER and
the concept the SIGNIFIED.

30. 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.

31. A sign is a recognizable combination of a signifier
with a particular signified.
— signifier : the word ‘Open’
— signified concept : the shop is open for
business

32. PRINCIPLE 1
The arbitrary
nature of the
sign.

33. The sign by Saussure
• - the sign relation is dyadic
• - essentially arbitrary motivated only by
social convention. Saussure's theory has been
particularly influential in the study of
linguistic signs.

34. arbitrary- no intrinsic or natural
reason why a particular form signifies a
particular concept.
Teacher
Maestro
Guro
Signifier Signified

35. CONVENTION
That’s what dictates rules of SIGNS, and NOT the
intrinsic value of the word or gesture or symbol.

36. NEVERTHELESS:
SYMBOL – never wholly arbitrary
ARBITRARY – is not left to an
individual; needs the
acceptance of the “community”

37. Objections to
ARBITRARINESS
ONOMATOPEIA
1) Never organic elements of a linguistic system
2) Few in number
3) Can also evolve
4) May even differ from one language to another

38. Objections to
INTERJECTIONS
ONOMATOPEIA
1) Never organic elements of a linguistic system
2) Few in number
3) Can also evolve
4) May even differ from one language to another

44. PRINCIPLE 2
The linear
nature of the
Signifier.

45. PRINCIPLE 1
Being auditory, the signifier is
unfolded solely in time from
which it gets the following 2
characteristics:
1) It represents a span
2) The span is measurable; it is a line

47. II: LINGUISTIC VALUE
Thought is a shapeless mass, which is only ordered
by language. One of the questions philosophers have
puzzled over for centuries is whether ideas can exist
at all without language. No ideas preexist language;
language itself gives shape to ideas and makes them
expressible.
The VALUE of a sign is determined, however, not by
what signifiers get linked to what particular
signifieds, but rather by the whole system of signs
used within a community. VALUE is the product of a
system or structure (LANGUE), not the result of
individual relations (PAROLE).

50. III.SYNTAGMATIC AND ASSOCIATIVE
RELATIONS
The most important kind of relation between units in
a signifying system, is a SYNTAGMATIC relation. This
means, basically, a LINEAR relation. In spoken or written
language, words come out one by one .Because language is
linear, it forms a chain, by which one unit is linked to
the next.
An example “”The cat sat on the mat””
“” The mat sat on the cat “”
English word order :SVO
Japanese word order:SOV etc.

51. SYNTAGMS
Combinations or relations formed by
position within a chain are called
SYNTAGMS.
The terms within a syntagm acquire
VALUE only because they stand in
opposition to everything before or after
them. Each term IS something because
it is NOT something else in the
sequence.

52. SYNTAGMS
SYNTAGMATIC relations are
most crucial in written and
spoken language, in
DISCOURSE, where the ideas of
time, linearity, and syntactical
meaning are important.

55. ASSOCIATIVE
Signs are stored in your memory, for
example, not in syntagmatic links or
sentences, but in ASSOCIATIVE groups.
"Education" "-tion":education,
relation, association

56. ASSOCIATIVE
Similar associations: education, teacher,
textbook, college, expensive.
Random set of linkages: education, baseball,
computer games, psychoanalysis, etc

57. ASSOCIATIVE
ASSOCIATIVE relations are only in your head,
not in the structure of language itself,
whereas SYNTAGMATIC relations
are a product of linguistic structure.

58. Ferdinand
Mongin de
Saussure
COURSE IN GENERAL LINGUISTICS