A linguist deaf to the poetic functions of language and a literary scholar indifferent to linguistics are equally flagrant anachronisms.

Every linguistic sign is located on two axes: the axis of simultaneity and that of succession.

A linguist deaf to the poetic functions of language and a literary scholar indifferent to linguistics are equally flagrant anachronisms.

Speech sounds cannot be understood, delimited, classified and explained except in the light of the tasks which they perform in language.

The poetic function is the set towards the message itself, focus on the message for its own sake which by promoting the palpability of signs, deepens the fundamental dichotomy of signs and objects.

It is once again the vexing problem of identity within variety; without a solution to this disturbing problem there can be no system, no classification.

Now the identification of individual sounds by phonetic observation is an artificial way of proceeding.