A Note on Some Basic Concepts of the Sign

Abstract

A conceptual basis for understanding meaning in language was established by Saussure’s analysis of the word as a sign in his Cours de Unguistique generale. His analysis has proved to be a point of departure for further studies in linguistics insofar as they are concerned with the signifying or semiotic function of language (rather than with problems that are principally philological, having to do with the historical development of particular languages). The contribution of Saussurian linguistics to epistemology has been enhanced by investigations in another discipline--philosophy--that have attempted to understand how words have meaning in ordinary language. This work originated with logical positivists in England and has since been pursued chiefly by English-speaking philosophers who are sometimes referred to as “ordinary language philosophers.” The best known of their publications is probably J.L. Austin’s How to do Things with Words. Put very simply, their investigations attempt to understand meaning in language by analyzing the word as a sign in the context of a given utterance.