Langue and Parôle

Conceptual Overview

Although Saussure worked in obscurity in his own lifetime, since the 1960s Saussurian linguistics have become influential as the conceptual underpinning of the heterogeneous group of approaches to social theory often termed structuralism, poststructuralism, and postmodernism. The most popular representatives of this scholarship are Michel Foucault and Jacques Derrida, although they are [Page 522]but two among quite a large group of scholars whose studies of the social construction of reality were paradigmatically structured within the “metaphor of text.”

The distinctive assumption of Saussurian linguistics that makes it foundational to constructionist inquiry is the principle that the signifier (the name, the word) is arbitrary. From this, it follows that the boundaries of meaning represented in language are socially produced and not something that can have a natural or objective reference point. Think, for example, of one of those popular novelty sets of refrigerator magnets containing a hundred or so pieces, each with one word printed on it. The set as a whole constitutes la langue, and any specific statement I may make with them is an example of la parôle. It is significant that, although I can make a great many different statements with the words contained in one set, I cannot make just any statement I might wish. There are limits to la parôle, and these are determined by the boundaries that constitute la langue.

Note also that these magnet sets are usually themed; for instance, many erotic sets are sold. Although such “languages” are rich in their abilities to describe love and sex, they are notably weak to express theology, economics, and many other notions. “Natural” languages (those found in society) also have this quality, which is one factor that gives linguistic analysis great power: Because the language reflects the values and norms of the society, its structure shows what must/can be thought or done. Its absences show what cannot (permissibly) be thought or done.

The distinction between la langue and la parôle is important, because analysis of either is valid as scholarship, but they are quite different objects. Just as a gun is not a murderer even when it is used to commit murder, a language is not a speech act, nor is it merely the sum of all speech acts in that language. The language is a system of rules defining what speech acts mean in that language; to confuse one with the other is a significant methodological and conceptual error. To return to the erotic refrigerator magnet set, I might conduct research on individual values and attitudes by recording what statements a group of subjects choose to create. This would be research of la parôle, speech acts. From this I might learn about the cognitive functioning of individuals. I might compare responses based on gender, age, or cultural background to better understand how these groups differ in attitudes toward sex and love. I could, however, learn very little from such research about la langue, because that would be the set of boundaries outside of our research and that determine the limits of that research. For instance, we could not conclude from such research that our subjects were obsessed with sex because it is the language itself that constrains their speech acts largely to sex-related notions.

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