Sample Essay on:
The Contributions of Ferdinand de Saussure to Modern Linguistics

Here is the synopsis of our sample research paper on The Contributions of Ferdinand de Saussure to Modern Linguistics. Have the paper e-mailed to you 24/7/365.

Essay / Research Paper Abstract

This 7 page report discusses Swiss linguist Ferdinand de Saussure (1857-1913) who is best-known for developing the ideas Plato originally presented in Cratylus regarding the relationship of the “signifier” to the “signified” which is also applicable to the “namer” and the “named.” For de Saussure the “signifier” are unified in an overall “sign” in which the signifier is the sound image related to a particular world while the signified is the conception or the mental image the sound evokes. Bibliography lists 4 sources.

Page Count:

7 pages (~225 words per page)

File: D0_BWsausur.rtf

Buy This Term Paper »

 

Unformatted sample text from the term paper:

"signifier" to the "signified" which is also applicable to the "namer" and the "named." For de Saussure the "signifier" are unified in an overall "sign" in which the signifier is the sound image related to a particular world while the signified is the conception or the mental image the sound evokes. His focus was on the fact that language is virtually always a structured system. He was the first to categorically establish a structuralist approach to linguistic study and was far more interested in describing and understanding the structure of language instead of the history of a specific language or the various forms of that language. As the student working on this project reviews se Saussures work, it will be important to understand that, from the perspective of structuralism, de Saussures contribution in linguistics was one in which the "naming" process associated with the overall context of language in which words are used to define what something is and, of course, what it is not. Klages (2003) notes that: "Saussure says this is a pretty naive or elementary view of language, but a useful one, because it gets across the idea that the basic linguistic unit has two parts" (Internet source). But as a structuralist, de Saussure was most interested in how words acted as separate units which constructed the whole of language. Furthermore, Saussure made a definite distinction between "synchronic" linguistics (studying language at a specific moment of time) from "diachronic" linguistics (which examines how language changes over time). The publication for which he is the most famous, A Course in General Linguistics, was published posthumously and is actually a compilation or transcription of notes from his many lectures that was put together by a number of his students after his death. It is here that the student ...

Search and Find Your Term Paper On-Line

Can't locate a sample research paper?
Try searching again:

Can't find the perfect research paper? Order a Custom Written Term Paper Now