Ferdinand Saussure
20th century literary theorist and linguist whose seminal work on semiotics influenced structuralism, new criticism and ultimately postmodernism. Saussure developed a now famous semiotic theory in which he formulaically described a sign as the sum of its signifier and signified. The ‘formula’ is as follows:
signifier + signified = sign
To understand this in terms of language, consider that the word ‘butterfly’, which exists (in this example) as English language text formed physically by the specified configuration of either the light on your computer monitor screen (or the ink on the page if you are reading a hardcopy) as letters making a word - as the signifier. Then consider the idea or concept (or perhaps more correctly - an idea or concept) of what a butterfly is – an insect with delicate and sometimes colorful wings that flutters through your garden (which definition, in strict literary terms is largely ‘relative to the beholder’ and to your idea of a butterly) – this would be the signified. The signifier and the signified together make up the sign that is, as it were, butterfly.
Saussure asserted that signifiers all have identifiable signifieds which are distinct from other signifieds, and that meaning in signs is thus derived from differences. Put basically - a butterfly is not an automobile, or more precisely, the signifieds of the signifier 'automobile' differ from the signifieds of signifier 'butterfly'.
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