Is “Sign” a Trans-Historical Concept? Derrida, Saussure, and the Limits of Genealogy

Car la signification « signe » a toujours été comprise et déterminée, dans son sens, comme signe-dé, signifiant renvoyant à un signifié, signifiant différent de son signifié. (bold added), Derrida, 1966.

Introduction: The Risk of Conceptual Continuity in Derrida’s Reading of Saussure

In Structure, Sign and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences, Derrida advances a far-reaching thesis: the concept of “sign” has always functioned within a structure of referral—“sign-of, signifier referring to a signified, signifier different from its signified” (Jacques Derrida, 1978, p. 281). On this basis, he aligns figures as distant as Aristotle, Augustine of Hippo, and Ferdinand de Saussure within a shared configuration governed by what he names the metaphysics of presence. The claim is not merely historical; it concerns an underlying structural logic that allegedly persists beneath theoretical transformations.

Yet this gesture raises a methodological difficulty. Saussure’s linguistics is defined by synchrony: elements acquire value only within a determinate état de langue. If so, can his technical notion of signe be assimilated to earlier philosophical uses of “sign” without neutralizing the very principle that grounds his project?

Note: Although Derrida repeatedly employs the terms signifier and signified throughout “Structure, Sign, and Play,” he does not mention Saussure by name. These terms are not neutral philosophical vocabulary; they belong to the highly specific structural framework articulated in Saussure’s Course in General Linguistics, where they designate two inseparable aspects of a single differential unit. Their extension beyond that framework therefore presupposes that the structural articulation they name is not limited to Saussure’s linguistics but characterizes Western thought more generally. Whether this presupposition can be sustained is a central question of the present analysis.

Derrida’s Structural Continuity Thesis

Derrida’s argument hinges on the persistence of a binary articulation. Even when the sign is displaced or reinterpreted, it remains tethered to the opposition between signifier and signified. “If one erases the radical difference between signifier and signified,” he writes, “it is the word ‘signifier’ itself which would have to be abandoned as a metaphysical concept” (Derrida, 1978, p. 281).

This assertion does not simply describe historical usage. It posits a structural invariant: Western thought repeatedly organizes meaning through a relation in which one term points beyond itself toward a determinable content. Differences between doctrines—more empirical, more systematic, more formalized—remain internal variations within a common syntactic grid.

The difficulty lies in determining whether this invariant is demonstrated or presupposed.

Representational Hierarchy: Aristotle and Augustine

In De Interpretatione, Aristotle states: “Spoken sounds are symbols of affections in the soul, and written marks symbols of spoken sounds… What these are in the first place signs of—affections of the soul—are the same for all; and what these affections are likenesses of—actual things—are also the same” (16a3–8). The structure is layered and asymmetrical: inscription refers to voice, voice to mental affection, affection to being. Presence anchors the chain.

Augustine’s semiotics maintains a comparable orientation. A sign is something that presents itself to the senses while directing the mind toward something other than itself. The sensible functions as vehicle; intelligibility constitutes destination. Despite theological differences, the hierarchy remains intact: the sign mediates access to what precedes it.

In both cases, the sign operates within a metaphysics of derivation.

Saussure’s Differential Reconfiguration

Saussure’s formulation in the Course in General Linguistics appears to rupture this schema. “A linguistic sign is not a link between a thing and a name,” he insists, “but between a concept and a sound pattern” (Saussure, 1916/2011, p. 98). More radically: “No ideas are established in advance, and nothing is distinct, before the introduction of linguistic structure” (pp. 155–156). The system, not the term, is primary; “the system as a united whole is the starting point” (p. 157).

Here the signified is not an antecedent presence awaiting designation. It is co-constituted through differential relations internal to a structured whole. Value arises negatively, through opposition, within a synchronic field.

Saussure further insists that elements from different synchronic states do not form a system. A Latin etymon and its modern French descendant are historically related yet structurally incommensurable; they belong to distinct configurations of value. Synchrony is not a heuristic convenience but a methodological boundary.

If this principle is taken seriously, then Aristotle’s σημείον, Augustine’s signum, and Saussure’s signe do not participate in a single system. Each term acquires meaning within a discrete theoretical ensemble. Conceptual identity cannot be inferred from lexical continuity.

Genealogy versus Synchrony

Derrida approaches the problem genealogically. He traces a recurring opposition—sensible/intelligible, signifier/signified—across centuries, arguing that even attempts to displace the hierarchy remain caught within its syntax. The sign persists as the name of this structure of referral.

Saussure, by contrast, delimits his object synchronically. Elements defined within one state cannot be projected into another without distortion. If this restriction applies to linguistic units, why would it not also apply to theoretical vocabulary? Each conceptual framework functions analogously to a micro-langue: a structured totality in which terms gain value relationally. To extract “the sign” from these systems and treat it as a trans-historical invariant risks reinstating precisely the type of identity that structural analysis suspends.

The tension is methodological. Derrida’s genealogy presupposes continuity at the level of structural articulation; Saussure’s synchrony suspends precisely such cross-system continuity. One privileges recurrence; the other enforces delimitation.

Does Saussure Remain Within the Metaphysics of Presence?

The decisive question is whether Saussure’s signifier/signified distinction reinstates representational hierarchy or transforms it. Derrida contends that the distinction cannot escape the logic it seeks to modify. The very articulation of a signifier distinct from a signified reinscribes metaphysical difference.

Yet in Saussure’s framework, neither pole grounds the other. Their distinction is functional, internal to a relational network. There is no appeal to a pre-linguistic presence that would stabilize meaning from outside the system. The opposition operates without ontological priority.

If so, the structural homology with Aristotle’s or Augustine’s models weakens. What appears as continuity may conceal a reconfiguration: from a hierarchy of mediation to a differential field without origin.

Conclusion: The Stakes of Conceptual History

The issue is not whether Derrida identifies recurrent oppositions in Western thought; he demonstrably does. The issue is whether the recurrence of certain terms warrants the postulation of a unified “concept of the sign.” Saussure’s synchrony suggests caution: elements drawn from different structural states do not form a system merely by sharing a name.

If conceptual history overrides structural specificity, then “the sign” becomes a genealogical abstraction. If structural delimitation prevails, continuity must be argued at the level of function, not vocabulary. The dispute concerns method: whether theoretical terms may traverse epochs as invariant operators, or whether each framework demands internal reconstruction before comparison.

Derrida’s thesis gains force from its breadth. Its vulnerability lies in that same breadth. To demonstrate continuity, it must show that Saussure’s differential unit reproduces the logic of presence rather than displacing it. Without that demonstration, the trans-historical “sign” risks becoming the very metaphysical unity deconstruction seeks to unsettle.

References

Aristotle. (2002). Categories and De Interpretatione (J. L. Ackrill, Trans.). Oxford University Press. (Original work published ca. 4th century BCE)

Derrida, J. (1978). Structure, sign and play in the discourse of the human sciences. In Writing and Difference (A. Bass, Trans., pp. 278–293). University of Chicago Press. (Original work presented 1966)

Saussure, F. de. (2011). Course in General Linguistics (W. Baskin, Trans.). Columbia University Press. (Original work published 1916)

Daylight, R. (2011). What if Derrida was wrong about Saussure? Edinburgh University Press.