Language is a form, not a substance.

"[E]xecution [of a speech act] is never carried out by the

collectivity. Execution is always individual, and the individual

is always its master: i shall call the executive side speaking

[_parole_]." {<[LINK]> Suassure 13}

For language [_la lange_] is not complete in any speaker; it

exists perfectly only within a collectivity. In separating

language from speaking, we are separating: (1) what is social

[_la lange_] from what is individual [_parole_]; and (2) what is

essential from what is more or less accessory. Language is not a

function of the speaker."{<[LINK]> Saussure 14}

Language "is the social side of speech, outside the individual

who can never create nor modify it by himself; it exists only by

virtue of a sort of contract signed by the members of a

community." {<[LINK]> Saussure 14}

"Language, unlike speaking, is something that we can study

separately....indeed, the science of language is possible only if

the other elements are excluded." He cites the study of dead

languages from reconstructed text fragments as an example. {<[LINK]>

Saussure 15}

Language resides within speech data, but can be studied as a

social institution, whereas speaking cannot, the latter being

solely the domain of the individual. Saussure proposed studying

language as it is situated within speech data, "_A science that

studies the life of signs within society_." He named this field

"semiotics," distinct from the study of the mutable relationship

between the signifiers and signified that constitute those signs,

semantics.

Saussure has a critique of the "psychologists" that closely

resembles Hymes's criticism of the generativists: "Then there is

the viewpoint of the psychologist, who studies the sign mechanism

in the individual; this is the easiest method, but it does not

reach the sign, which is social." {<[LINK]> Saussure 17}

"If we are to discover the true nature of language we must learn

what it has in common with all other semiological systems....By

studying rites, customs, etc. as signs, I beleive that we shall

thrpow new light on the facts and point up the need for including

them in a science of semiology and explaining them by its laws."

{<[LINK]> Saussure 17}

"Language is comparable to a symphony in that what the symmphony

actually is stands completely apart from how it is performed; the

mistakes that musicians make in playing the symphony do not

compromise this fact." {<[LINK]> Saussure 18} This is a perfect

analogy for competence and performance.

Hymes conflation of Saussure and Chomsky:

competence=la lange=removed from social context=internal

perf =speaking/parole=situated in social context=external

Hymes + -

social context + -

emic + -

real + -

lang= social fact outside of individual--must be socially

situated.

speaking= utterances of individuals--not in domain of

society.

internal to language: the social fact of language as

apparent to one within the society--emic--a borrowed word is used

in the social fact of the language situated within the society

external to language: ethnography, history, geography...--

influences which an external observer would see but are not

apparent to an insider--etic--a borrowed word comes from another

language

Chomsky

competence=internal= I language = idealized speaker in a

homogeneous community = the symphony as composed = represented

performance = external = E language = speech acts situated in

social contexts = a particular execution of the symphony =

communicated