Ferdinand de Saussure quotes

Ferdinand de Saussure was a Swiss educator and linguist, widely regarded as one of the founding figures of modern linguistics. His theories about the structure of language laid the groundwork for many later developments in the field. He profoundly influenced linguistics, semiotics, and many areas of the humanities. Here are 36 of his quotes:

Nearly all institutions, it might be said, are based on signs, but these signs do not directly evoke things. (Ferdinand de Saussure)
Within speech, words are subject to a kind of relation that is independent of the first and based on their linkage: these are syntagmatic relations, of which I have spoken. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
Everyone, left to his own devices, forms an idea about what goes on in language which is very far from the truth. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
Linguistics will have to recognise laws operating universally in language, and in a strictly rational manner, separating general phenomena from those restricted to one branch of languages or another. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
A linguistic system is a series of differences of sound combined with a series of differences of ideas. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
Without language, thought is a vague, uncharted nebula. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
Time changes all things; there is no reason why language should escape this universal law. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
I'm almost never serious, and I'm always too serious. Too deep, too shallow. Too sensitive, too cold hearted. I'm like a collection of paradoxes. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
Speech has both an individual and a social side, and we cannot conceive of one without the other. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
Psychologically our thought-apart from its expression in words-is only a shapeless and indistinct mass. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
A language presupposes that all the individual users possess the organs. (Ferdinand de Saussure)
Outside speech, the association that is made in the memory between words having something in common creates different groups, series, families, within which very diverse relations obtain but belonging to a single category: these are associative relations. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
It is useful to the historian, among others, to be able to see the commonest forms of different phenomena, whether phonetic, morphological or other, and how language lives, carries on and changes over time. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
It is only since linguistics has become more aware of its object of study, i.e. perceives the whole extent of it, that it is evident that this science can make a contribution to a range of studies that will be of interest to almost anyone. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
Any psychology of sign systems will be part of social psychology - that is to say, will be exclusively social; it will involve the same psychology as is applicable in the case of languages. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
Henceforth, language studies were no longer directed merely towards correcting grammar. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
It is one of the aims of linguistics to define itself, to recognise what belongs within its domain. In those cases where it relies upon psychology, it will do so indirectly, remaining independent. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
In fact, from then on scholars engaged in a kind of game of comparing different Indo-European languages with one another, and eventually they could not fail to wonder what exactly these connections showed, and how they should be interpreted in concrete terms. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
The first of these phases is that of grammar, invented by the Greeks and carried on unchanged by the French. It never had any philosophical view of a language as such. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
In general, the philological movement opened up countless sources relevant to linguistic issues, treating them in quite a different spirit from traditional grammar; for instance, the study of inscriptions and their language. But not yet in the spirit of linguistics. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
The critical principle demanded an examination, for instance, of the contribution of different periods, thus to some extent embarking on historical linguistics. (Ferdinand de Saussure)
The very special place that a language occupies among institutions is undeniable, but there is much more to be said-, a comparison would tend rather to bring out the differences. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
The business, task or object of the scientific study of languages will if possible be 1) to trace the history of all known languages. Naturally this is possible only to a very limited extent and for very few languages. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
Thus we may found the science for the study of the life of signs against the background of social life; it would form part of social psychology, and consequently of general psychology; we shall call it semiology (from Greek sēmeion - 'sign'). That science would explain to us in what signs consist of and by what laws they are governed. Since it is a science which does not yet exist, we do not know what it will be like; it has, however, a reason for its existence, its place is allocated in advance. Linguistics is only a part of that general science; the laws which semiology will discover, will be applicable also to linguistics, which in turn will be linked with a domain clearly defined throughout the entirety of human affairs. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure
The characteristic role of language with respect to thought is not to create a material phonic means for expressing ideas but to serve as a link between thought and sound. View quote
Ferdinand de Saussure

Ferdinand de Saussure

Ferdinand de Saussure - Image
Occupation: Swiss Educator
Born: November 26, 1857
Died: February 22, 1913
Quotes count: 36

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