Lingvistica are ca unic si veritabil obiect limba conceputa in ea insasi si pentru ea insasi.

Saussure spune ca :semnul lingvistic nu uneste un un lucru cu un nume, ci

un concept (semnificat) cu o imagine acustica (semnificant). Semnificat/semnificant = concept/imagine Sistemul lingvistic al lui Saussure este considerat drept un sistem semiotic bilateral. Prin aceasta definire a semnului, Saussure depaseste granitele lingvisticii generale, el incluzand toate semnele pe care le folosim pentru a comunica in cadrul vietii sociale(de la semnele scrierii, la alfabetul surdo-mutilor, de la formulele de politete, la obiceiuri, ritualuri, de la semnalele militare, la pantomima).
Limbaj Facultate a speciei umane Limba Forma particulara a limbajului intr-o anumita comunitate sociala Vorbire Punerea in practica a limbajului.

Valoarea unui cuvant in sistem este rezultatul compararii cu cuvinte similare si opozabile. Moutton ?(franceza) = sheep (engleza) = aceeasi semnificatie = mutton (engleza) = bucata de carne servita la masa) = valori diferite. Semnificatii sunt asociati unei semnificatii in virtutea codurilor. Cod = conventii sociale in conformitate cu care seminficantii sunt utilizati in situatii de comunicare. Semnul este arbitrar = semnificantul este arbitrar in raport cu semnificatul, cu care nu are nicio legatura naturala in realitate.

Daniel Chandler, 2007, Semiotics. The Basics, London & New York, Routledge, pp. 13-28 (subcap. The Saussurean Model)
We seem as a species to be driven by a desire to make meanings: above all, we are surely homo significans meaning-makers. Distinctively, we make meanings through our creation and interpretation of signs.

according to Peirce, we think only in signs (Peirce 193158, 2.302). Signs take the form of words, images, sounds, odours, flavours, acts or objects, but such things have no intrinsic meaning and become signs only when we invest them with meaning. Nothing is a sign unless it is interpreted as a sign, declares Peirce Saussures model of the sign is in the dyadic tradition (two parts of a sign consist of a sign vehicle and its meaning) Focusing on linguistic signs (such as words), Saussure defined a sign as being composed of a signifier (material (or physical) form of the sign) (signifiant) and a signified (signifi). Contemporary commentators tend to describe the signifier as the form that the sign takes and the signified as the concept to which it refers. Saussure makes the distinction in these terms: A linguistic sign is not a link between a thing and a name, but between a concept [signified] and a sound pattern [signifier]. Saussure stressed that sound and thought (or the signifier and the signified) were as inseparable as the two sides of a piece of paper (Saussure 1983, 111). They were intimately linked in the mind by an associative link each triggers the other (ibid., 66). Saussure presented these elements as wholly interdependent, neither pre-existing the other.

THE RELATIONAL SYSTEM (?) ARBITRARINESS (?)

the process which selects one particular sound-sequence to correspond to one particular idea is completely arbitrary