Chess, Language, and Thought: Saussure and Wittgenstein on the Rules of the Game

Detail from Die Schachspieler by Moritz Retzsch

 Introduction

Language has long fascinated philosophers and linguists alike. Ferdinand de Saussure and Ludwig Wittgenstein—working in different contexts—both challenged traditional notions of meaning, rejecting the idea that words merely function as names for things. Central to their respective critiques is the metaphor of the chess game, which each theorist employed to reframe how we think about meaning, value, and linguistic identity. As Roy Harris notes, both thinkers “dismiss the representational theory of language in favor of a rule-based model of meaning.”¹

Challenging Nomenclature: The Quest for Linguistic Identity

This shared metaphor of chess emerges from a deeper critique both thinkers develop—a dissatisfaction with nomenclaturism—the belief that language operates primarily through a one-to-one correspondence between words and things.² Both thinkers viewed this as a misleading simplification that failed to account for how meaning is actually generated within a linguistic system.

For Wittgenstein, the identity of a linguistic expression does not lie in a fixed referent but in its use within a rule-governed activity—a language game. In Philosophical Investigations, he asks: “Wer von einem Tag auf den andern verspricht ‘Morgen will ich dich besuchen’—sagt der jeden Tag das Gleiche; oder jeden Tag etwas anderes?”³ The implication is that identical utterances can have distinct functions depending on their contextual use, highlighting how meaning is not reducible to a static correspondence.

Similarly, Saussure draws attention to how phonetic variation does not necessarily entail semantic difference: “Lorsque, dans une conférence, on entend répéter à plusieurs reprises le mot Messieurs! ... les variations de débit et l’intonation la présentent ... avec des différences phoniques très appréciables.”⁴ These subtle phonetic changes do not compromise the identity of the expression, reinforcing Saussure’s view that the linguistic sign is defined not by intrinsic properties but by its position within a differential system.

The Chessboard Analogy: Internal Rules and Functional Identity

To illustrate their anti-nomenclaturist positions, both Wittgenstein and Saussure turn to the analogy of chess. Wittgenstein writes:

“Wir reden von dem räumlichen und zeitlichen Phänomen der Sprache... Aber wir reden von ihr so, wie von den Figuren des Schachspiels, indem wir Spielregeln für sie angeben, nicht ihre physikalischen Eigenschaften beschreiben. Die Frage ‘Was ist eigentlich ein Wort?’ ist analog der ‘Was ist eine Schachfigur?’”⁵

Here, Wittgenstein emphasizes that words, like chess pieces, derive their identity from the rules governing their use rather than from any physical or essential properties. For him, “language is no more a system of names than chess is a system of carved figurines.”⁶

Saussure, writing decades earlier, employs a remarkably similar metaphor:

“La langue est un système qui ne connaît que son ordre propre. Une comparaison avec le jeu d’échecs le fera mieux sentir… Si je remplace des pièces de bois par des pièces d’ivoire, le changement est indifférent pour le système : mais si je diminue ou augmente le nombre des pièces, ce changement-là atteint profondément la ‘grammaire’ du jeu.”⁷

What matters in language, as in chess, is not the material form of the elements but the relational structure they inhabit. Saussure’s emphasis on valeur—the differential value of signs—echoes Wittgenstein’s functional definition of linguistic meaning.⁸ Both thinkers propose a “self-contained model” of language in which internal structure, not external reference, governs identity.⁹

Convergence of Perspectives: The Primacy of Internalism

Despite their differences—Saussure working within structural linguistics and Wittgenstein within the philosophy of language—both reject the myth of referential transparency. The chessboard analogy functions not merely as a rhetorical device, but as a conceptual model for understanding language as a system defined by internal relations and rules. To seek the meaning of a word outside the system, both argue, is to fundamentally misunderstand its nature.

Wittgenstein's later philosophy insists that meaning is use; Saussure’s structuralism insists that meaning arises from difference. These positions, while distinct in emphasis, converge in their challenge to nomenclaturism and in their rejection of a metaphysical grounding for language.

As Harris concludes, “If Saussure was concerned with the structure of language, and Wittgenstein with its use, both recognized that linguistic meaning emerges from systems governed by rules, not from things named by words.”¹⁰ The chessboard metaphor thus serves as a shared platform from which both theorists redefine linguistic identity—not as a matter of naming or essence, but as a function of structured interplay, differential relation, and rule-governed use.

Bibliography

Harris, Roy. Language, Saussure and Wittgenstein: How to Play Games with Words. London: Routledge, 1990.
Saussure, Ferdinand de. Cours de linguistique générale. Edited by Charles Bally and Albert Sechehaye, with the collaboration of Albert Riedlinger. Lausanne and Paris: Payot, 1916.
Wittgenstein, Ludwig. Philosophische Untersuchungen. In Werkausgabe, Band 1, edited by G. E. M. Anscombe, R. Rhees, and G. H. von Wright. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp Verlag, 1999.

Footnotes

1. Roy Harris, Language, Saussure and Wittgenstein (London: Routledge, 1990), 12.

2. Ibid., 11.

3. Ludwig Wittgenstein, Philosophische Untersuchungen, §226.

4. Ferdinand de Saussure, Cours de linguistique générale, §151.

5. Wittgenstein, Philosophische Untersuchungen, §108.

6. Harris, Language, Saussure and Wittgenstein, 17.

7. Saussure, Cours de linguistique générale, §43.

8. Ibid., §119.

9. Harris, Language, Saussure and Wittgenstein, 24.

10. Ibid., 31.