Basics

• synchronic: state of language at a certain point in time

• diachronic: development of language over time

• descriptive: what speakers do

• prescriptive: what speakers should do

• empricial: based on authentic data

• introspective: based on the intuitions of linguists

• Displacement

• Arbitrariness

• Productivity

• Cultural transmission

• Duality of pattern

• Reflexivity

ability to talk about other things than “here and now”

no natural, inherent relationship between signs

(sounds, letters) and their meaning

ability to continuously create new words and sentences

language is acquired, not innate

limited number of basic units, but near infinite

number of meaningful combinations

humans can use language to think and talk about

language itself

• We learn to speak long before we learn to write

• Historically, humans spoke long before they invented writing

• Not all languages have writing systems

• Writing is an invention meant to represent or record speech, not the

other way around

• Binary

• Reciprocal

• Arbitrary

• Conventional

• Linear

• Differential

Two components

the signifier evokes the

signified, and vice versa

relation between signifier and signified is unmotivated and not based on natural causes

the relationship between signifier and signified is based on a tacit agreement between speakers of a speech community

the signifier occupies a space in time, sounds are temporally ordered

a sign is defined by its relation to other signs in the linguistic system

• illustrates the dependent relationship between sound sequence (symbol), concept (thought) and object of reference in the real world (referent)

• no direct relationship between symbol and referent: linguistic expressions relate to the real world only through there meaning

• in contrast to Saussure, they included the object of reference into their model

• Key figure: Ferdinand de Saussure (Cours de linguistique génerale

(1916))

• Primacy of synchrony and the system

• Language as a closed system -> languages have to be investigated

individually

• Within this system the value of an element can only be defined by its

place in the system, i.e. linguistic signs are related to each other

• Langue: the abstract language system shared by a speech community that determines usage

• Parole: actual use of language by an individual in a given context

Saussure’s chess analogy:

• Langue: the rules that allow you to play, of which both players are aware

• Parole: the actual moves players decide to make

• Syntagmatic: combination of elements (e.g. the way sounds combine to form words; the way words combine to form sentences)

• Paradigmatic: selection of elements for a slot