Ferdinand de Saussure (1857–1913) is routinely criticized for denying the possibility of iconicity in language through his principle of the arbitrariness of linguistic signs. Yet two of his articles, one from the beginning (1877) and the other from the end (1912) of his career, propose analyses of the development of certain Latin verbs and adjectives in which iconicity plays a key role. Saussure did not dismiss iconicity, but limited its sphere of application to the relationship between signs and their referents, which falls outside linguistics as he defined it. Hence iconicity does not contradict arbitrariness, which applies to the relationship between signifier and signified within the linguistic sign.
1983 “Théodore Flournoy, la découverte de l’inconscient”. Les bloc-notes de la psychanalyse 31.111–131, followed by her “Présentation” (pp. 133–135) of Saussure’s “Réponse à une enquête sur l’audition colorée” (137–139, repr. from Flournoy (1893: 50–52).
Culler, Jonathan
2003 “L’essentiel de l’arbitraire”. Ferdinand de Saussure ed. by Simon Bouquet (= Cahiers de l’Herne, 76), 52–61. Paris: L’Herne.
De Crue, Francis
1915 [1913] “Allocution de M. le professeur Francis De Crue, doyen de la Faculté des Lettres et des Sciences sociales”. Ferdinand de Saussure (1857–1913) [assembled by Marie de Saussure], 15–23. [Genève: Imprimerie W. Kündig.]
1881La parole intérieure: Essai de psychologie descriptive. Paris: Germer Baillière.
Flournoy, Théodore
1893Des phénomènes de synopsie (audition colorée): Photismes – schèmes visuels – personnifications. Genève: Charles Eggimann; Paris: Félix Alcan.
Gmür, Remo
1990 “Saussures ‘Mémoire’-Prinzipien in seinen späteren indogermanistischen Arbeiten”. Présence de Saussure: Actes du Colloque internationale de Genève (21–23 mars 1988) ed. by René Amacker & Rudolf Engler, 39–51. Genève: Droz.
Grassmann, Hermann
1862 “Ueber die verbindung der konsonanten mit folgendem j und die davon abhängigen erscheinungen”. Zeitschrift für vergleichende Sprachforschung auf dem Gebiete des Deutschen, Griechischen und Lateinischen (Kuhn’s Zeitschrift), 111.1–52.
Hartley, David
1747An Enquiry into the Origin of the Human Appetites and Affections, shewing how each arises from association, with an account of the entrance of moral evil into the world. To which are added some remarks on the independent scheme, which deduces all obligation on God’s part and man’s from certain abstract relations, truth, &c. Written for the use of the young gentlemen at the universities. Lincoln: Printed by W. Wood, and sold by R. Dodsley, at Tully’s Head, in Pall-Mall.
Havet, Louis
1879Review of Saussure (1879). Journal de Genève, 25 fév. 1879, n° 47, Supplément, pp. 1–2.
Hutton, Christopher M.
1989 “The Arbitrary Nature of the Sign”. Semiotica 75.1/2.63–78.
Itkonen, Esa
2013 “Philosophy of Linguistics”. The Oxford Handbook of the History of Linguistics ed. by Keith Allan, 747–774. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Jakobson, Roman
1965 “Quest for the Essence of Language”. Diogenes 131.21–37.
2003 “Orthodox Unorthodoxy”. Language Sciences 251.99–109.
Joseph, John E.
2010a “ ‘La teinte de tous les ciels’: Divergence et nuance dans la conception saussurienne du changement linguistique”. Cahiers Ferdinand de Saussure 631.145–158.
Joseph, John E.
2010b “Hermeneiaphobia: Why an ‘inventive’ linguistics must first embrace interpretation”. Inventive Linguistics ed. by Sandrine Sorlin, 95–105. Montpellier: Presses Universitaires de la Méditerranée.
Joseph, John E.
2012Saussure. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Joseph, John E.
2013 “Identity Work and Face Work across Linguistic and Cultural Boundaries”. Journal of Politeness Research 9/1.35–54.
Joseph, John E.
2014 “Saussure’s Sound Symbolism”. History and Philosophy of the Language Sciences, [URL]
Joseph, John E.
Forthcoming. “‘The vivid portrayal of what they value’: Imitation, association and nervous excitement in the history of sign theory”. Towards a History of Sound-Symbolic Theories ed. by Luca Nobile 000 000 Amsterdam & Philadelphia John Benjamins
Joseph, John E., Nigel Love & Talbot J. Taylor
2001Landmarks in Linguistic Thought II: The Western tradition in the 20th century. London & New York: Routledge.
Konow, Sten
1927 “Obituary of Vilhelm Thomsen”. Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, No. 4 (Oct. 1927), 929–934.
2013 “A History of Sound Symbolism”. The Oxford Handbook of the History of Linguistics ed. by Keith Allan, 191–208. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Mill, John Stuart
1867 [1
1865] An Examination of Sir William Hamilton’s Philosophy, and of the principal philosophical questions discussed in his writings. 3rd ed. London: Longmans, Green, Reader & Dyer.
Morris, Charles
1946Signs, Language and Behavior. New York: Prentice-Hall.
Peirce, Charles Sanders
1931–1958The Collected Papers of Charles Sanders Peirce. 81 vols. Vols. I–VI1 ed. by Charles Hartshorne & Paul Weiss (1931–1935), vols. VII–VIII1 ed. by Arthur W. Burks (1958) Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.
Petrilli, Susan
2011Expression and Interpretation in Language. New Brunswick, N.J.: Transaction Publishers.
Saussure, Ferdinand de
1877 “Sur une classe de verbes latins en –eo”. Mémoires de la Société de Linguistique de Paris 31.279–293. (Repr. in Saussure 1922.353–369.)
Saussure, Ferdinand de
1879Mémoire sur le système primitif des voyelles dans les langues indoeuropéennes. Leipzig: printed by B. G. Teubner.
Saussure, Ferdinand de
1905 “D’ὠμήλυσις à Τριπτόλεμος: Remarques étymologiques”. Mélanges Nicole: Recueil de mémoires de philologie classique et d’archéologie offerts à Jules Nicole, 503–514. Genève: Imprimerie W. Kündig & Fils. (Repr. in Saussure 1922.576–584.)
Saussure, Ferdinand de
1909 “Sur les composés latins du type agricola”. Philologie et linguistique: Mélanges offerts à Louis Havet par ses anciens élèves et ses amis à l’occasion du 60e anniversaire de sa naissance le 6 janvier 1909, 459–471. Paris: Hachette. (Repr. in Saussure 1922.585–594.)
Saussure, Ferdinand de
1912 “Adjectifs indo-européens du type caecus ‘aveugle’”. Festschrift Vilhelm Thomsen zur Vollendung des siebzigsten Lebensjahres am 25. Januar 1912, dargebracht von Freunden und Schülern, 202–206. Leipzig: Otto Harrassowitz. (Repr. in Saussure 1922.595–599.)
Saussure, Ferdinand de
1916Cours de linguistique générale. Ed. by Charles Bally & Albert Sechehaye, with the assistance of Albert Riedlinger. Lausanne & Paris: Payot. (2nd ed. 1922; subsequent editions have minor corrections only.)
Saussure, Ferdinand de
1922Recueil des publications scientifiques de Ferdinand de Saussure. [Ed. by Charles Bally & Léopold Gautier]. Genève: Sonor; Lausanne: Payot; Heidelberg: Carl Winter.
Saussure, Ferdinand de
1997Deuxième cours de linguistique générale (1908–1909), d’après les cahiers d’Albert Riedlinger et Charles Patois / Saussure’s Second Course on General Linguistics (1908–1909), from the notebooks of Albert Riedlinger and Charles Patois, ed. by Eisuke Komatsu, transl. by George Wolf. Oxford & New York: Pergamon.
Saussure, Ferdinand de & Émile Constantin
2005Saussure, “Notes préparatoires pour le cours de linguistique générale 1910–1911”; Constantin, “Linguistique générale, cours de M. le professeur de Saussure 1910–1911”, ed. by Daniele Gambarara & Claudia Mejía Quijano, Cahiers Ferdinand de Saussure 581.71–290.
Wang, Xueqing
2010 “Language Iconicity from Sociolinguistic Perspective”. Asian Social Science 6.7.176–179.
Waugh, Linda R.
1994 “Degrees of Iconicity in the Lexicon”. Journal of Pragmatics 221.55–70.
Whorf, Benjamin Lee
1937 “A Linguistic Consideration of Thinking in Primitive Communities”. First published in Language, Thought, and Reality: Selected Papers of Benjamin Lee Whorf ed. by John B. Carroll, 65–86. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press 1956.
Willems, Klaas
2005 “Die Grenzen der Ikonizität der Sprache: Saussures Konzeption des ‘fait linguistique’ revisited”. Kodikas/Code Ars Semeiotica 28.3/4.243–272.
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D'Onofrio, Annette & Penelope Eckert
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Lacey, Simon, Yaseen Jamal, Sara M. List, Kelly McCormick, K. Sathian & Lynne C. Nygaard
2020. Stimulus Parameters Underlying Sound‐Symbolic Mapping of Auditory Pseudowords to Visual Shapes. Cognitive Science 44:9
McCormick, Kelly, Simon Lacey, Randall Stilla, Lynne C. Nygaard & K. Sathian
2021. Neural Basis of the Sound-Symbolic Crossmodal Correspondence Between Auditory Pseudowords and Visual Shapes. Multisensory Research 35:1 ► pp. 29 ff.
Newmeyer, Frederick J.
2019. The Sign Theory of Language and the form-meaning interface / La Théorie du langage basée sur le signe et l’interface forme-sens. Canadian Journal of Linguistics/Revue canadienne de linguistique 64:02 ► pp. 171 ff.
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