Linguistics--The Sign

Although it is clear that structuralism, as a literary movement is unthinkable without Ferdinand de Saussure, his linguistic argument is difficult to assess. One of the main insights of Saussure’s essay is the arbitrary bond between the signifier and the signified. It is clear that Saussure’s “signifieds” are particles cut from the jumble of thought, which makes the attempt to decipher the relation of the mind to an extrinsic reality to be Saussure’s main goal.

Furthermore, one must understand that the emphasis here is on the reciprocal nature of the sign, which is split into two parts: a signifier and the signified. As he asserts, “The linguistic sign unites, not a thing and a name, but a concept and a sound-image” (Saussure 852). Sign, in this case, is not just a name for a thing, but a complicated entirety that links a “sound-image” and a “concept.” Saussure labels in the Course in General Linguistics, the former to be the signifier, and the latter—the signified. For instance, we have the concept of a car in our mind, but what we also have, is the word “car” which brings about the sound-image. If we think of a car, the form of it or the concept, we also, immediately think of that concept as the “car.” This seems like a standard explanation, in which the “car” for which “car” stands for is presumably the concept of car only, but one does wonder about the reference to the things to which words have no natural relationship. Do things exist outside the mind?

Another ambiguity that comes across while deciphering the text is whether or not a language makes the distiction directly, can also make it indirectly or completely ignore it. Discussion of differences between words in different languages, between synonyms in the same language, between words that are incommensurable or are antonyms, rely ultimately on sense verification in the real world. Certainly, it is true that one may not notice details in a perceived scene for which one has not been prepared by language, but as interesting as this may seem, it is insignificant alongside the inability to avoid certain sensations whether one has language for them or not. For instance, an experience like a headache does not depend on the existence of a signifier.

“So what?” I ask myself. We never get it quite right, and there are no definite outlines. There is nothing novel in recognizing the incongruence of language.

Work Cited

Saussure, Ferdinand. “From Course in General Linguistics.” The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. Ed. Vincent B. Leitch. 2nd ed. W.W. Norton & Company Inc.: New York, 2001. 850-66. Print.