Ferdinand de Saussure
(1857-1913)
Ferdinand de Saussure created the field of structural linguistics with his
Cours de linguistique générale in 1916, which was transcribed from his course lectures by students Charles Bally and Albert Sèchehaye. Saussure had published little after his 1878 Ph.D. "Dissertation on the Primitive Vowel System in Indo-European Languages," in which his speculations on lsryngeal vowels were attested (confirmed) in the discovery of the Hittite language.
Saussurie invented the notion of a linguistic sign, composed of two parts, the phonic or orthographic shape of any given word (the signifier) and the idea associated with it (the signified). Saussure argued that the relationship between the two was psychological, and purely
arbitrary, an invention by the creators of a language. This was the foundation of semiology, or in American schools, semiotics, which philosopher
Charles Sanders Peirce expanded to include two kinds of signs which are not arbitrary, icons and indexes. An icon resembles its signified, like the home symbol on web sites. An index has a natural connection with its signified, as smoke signifies fire.
While the work of linguistics is to discover the structure of a language, its grammar, syntax, and semantics, Saussure pointed out that educated speakers of a language in general know nothing of the structure and its elaborate rules. He called the structure and rules the
langue and the speech
parole.
The great American linguist
Noam Chomsky extended Saussure's ideas, claiming that human brains contain a "deep structure" that embodies the rules of human languages. Chomsky redefined Saussure's distinction between
langue and
parole as "competence" and "performance." Professionals like Saussure and himself exhibit "competence." Everyday speakers who are following all the rules perfectly without knowing them are capable of "performance."
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