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Forums => English & Linguistics => Topic started by: sweet clementine on January 25, 2010, 12:31:27 PM

Title: Souseur
Post by: sweet clementine on January 25, 2010, 12:31:27 PM

I think I spelled that name wrong, but we're studying him in my theory class and I'm having some serious issues with him.  But allegedly he is the father of modern linguistics so I thought I'd ask you linguistic nuts what you think of him?  The guy who developed the signifier and the signified as the basis of language.  Ultimately argued that language comes before thought and possibly even reality.  Serious issues with him.

Title: Souseur
Post by: Porter on January 25, 2010, 01:26:36 PM

Saussure

Title: Souseur
Post by: Porter on January 25, 2010, 01:34:27 PM

You know, people never get upset that 19th-century physicists got things wrong.

Title: Souseur
Post by: The Genuine on January 25, 2010, 02:20:40 PM

I don't get upset that any predecessor, from any era, got something wrong.  Why would one?

Title: Souseur
Post by: pooka on January 25, 2010, 08:43:10 PM

I didn't really delve deep into Saussure.  I was way more interested in structure.

Have you been around for any of the cycles of peircian semiotics we get into around here?

I've been thinking a lot about something I read in Time this week, that McCain's staff "in their estimation" found Sarah Palin to stumble over syntax.  Syntax?  Really?  She must have some kind of brain injury or secretly be a chimpanzee.  

Title: Souseur
Post by: Jonathon on January 25, 2010, 08:55:36 PM

It is possible for a fully functional adult to produce syntactically malformed sentences in speech. I think it happens a lot more than most people realize. Just get a lot of the quote here (http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=841). But, of course, it's probably worth noting that laymen don't use "syntax" in quite the same way linguists do.