The Unity of Two Orders: Saussure and the Problem of the Linguistic Unit

“If we were invited first to determine the chemical classification of a sheet of iron, gold, or copper, and then the zoological species of a horse, cow, or sheep, these would be two easy tasks. But if we were asked to determine what ‘species’ is represented by the odd combination of an iron plaque attached to a horse, a gold plate on a cow, or a sheep adorned with something copper, we would exclaim that the task was absurd.

The linguist has to realize that it is precisely this absurd task that faces him right from the very outset.”

— Ferdinand de Saussure, Writings in General Linguistics

Introduction — The Sheep and the Metal Plate

What kind of object is a linguistic unit? In Writings in General Linguistics, p. 3, section “On the Dual Essence of Language” (De l’essence double du langage), Ferdinand de Saussure approaches this question through an apparently absurd example. A sheep can be classified without difficulty, as can a metal plate: the first belongs to a zoological order, the second to a material or chemical one. But what happens when a sheep carries a metal plate? The problem is no longer simply to identify either component; it is to determine how an entity composed of elements belonging to different orders could itself be classified.

Saussure presents this as precisely the difficulty confronting the linguist. The linguistic entity is not a simple homogeneous object whose properties can be determined independently of its constitution. It involves an association between elements that belong to different orders.

The example becomes clearer when placed alongside the methodological problem developed in the Course in General Linguistics. Langage encompasses physical, physiological, psychological, individual, and social dimensions and therefore does not present linguistics with a single, self-evident object. Langue, understood as a structured system, provides the principle of organization through which a specifically linguistic domain can be constituted. Yet the units belonging to that system have a peculiar status: their constitution involves the association of two distinct dimensions.

Why, then, does Saussure compare the linguistic entity to a sheep carrying a metal plate? The question leads from the problem of constituting a linguistic field to the more specific problem of understanding the kind of unit that belongs to it.

1. From Langage to Langue

Saussure begins the Course by observing that langage, taken as a whole, is “many-sided and heterogeneous.” It extends across physical, physiological, and psychological domains and belongs simultaneously to the individual and to society. Such diversity creates a methodological difficulty because the phenomenon does not arrive before the linguist as a clearly bounded object. Different approaches can isolate different aspects of it, but no single perspective establishes what should count as the object of linguistics.

This is why Saussure distinguishes langage from langue. La langue, considered as an established system, is “both a self-contained whole and a principle of classification.” The expression is important because langue does more than designate one portion of the broader phenomenon. It provides the order within which phenomena can be identified and related as linguistic phenomena.

The distinction should therefore not be understood as though the linguist first encounters a collection of already constituted linguistic objects and subsequently sorts them according to a convenient system. The system establishes the relations under which phenomena acquire linguistic significance. A sound considered as a physical event belongs to one domain of inquiry; considered as an element of la langue, it occupies a position within a network of relations that gives it a specifically linguistic function.

Langue thus provides a basis for constituting a linguistic field without reducing its heterogeneous manifestations to a single underlying kind. Once this point is established, a further question arises: what sort of entities does this organized system contain? Saussure's example of the sheep and the metal plate addresses that question.

2. The Sheep and the Metal Plate

The force of Saussure's example lies in the fact that neither component presents a classificatory problem on its own. A sheep can be placed within a zoological classification, while a metal plate can be considered according to its material composition. Each belongs to an intelligible order whose criteria determine what counts as relevant and how its objects are distinguished.

The difficulty arises when the two are associated. A sheep carrying a metal plate does not thereby constitute a new zoological or chemical category. The procedures appropriate to either component separately cannot account for the composite entity. Saussure's point is that the linguist encounters an analogous difficulty from the beginning: linguistic entities involve what he calls “couplings of two different objects,” rather than simple homogeneous objects.

The comparison therefore concerns the peculiar status of a unit whose constitution involves elements belonging to different orders. In the Course, Saussure formulates the two sides of the sign as the signifier and the signified, corresponding to what he describes as the image acoustique and the concept. These should not be confused with the physical and physiological phenomena involved in speech. The vibrations produced by the vocal organs and perceived by the ear belong to the broader field of langage. The signifier relevant to the linguistic system is instead the image acoustique, a psychological entity associated with a concept.

This distinction prevents the duality of the sign from being reduced to a simple opposition between physical sound and mental meaning. Within langue, the relevant relation is between an acoustic image and a concept, and the linguistic entity exists through their association. The two sides remain distinguishable, but neither constitutes the linguistic unit on its own.

Yet this leaves a further problem unresolved. If the two sides remain distinct, what makes their association a unity rather than merely a juxtaposition?

3. The Sheet of Paper

Saussure's comparison of langue to a sheet of paper provides an answer. In the Course, he writes: “La langue est encore comparable à une feuille de papier.” He then compares thought to one side of the sheet and sound to the other: “la pensée est le recto et le son le verso.” The image explains why the two dimensions of the linguistic entity cannot be treated as independent components. Just as one cannot cut the front of a sheet without cutting the back, “dans la langue, on ne saurait isoler ni le son de la pensée, ni la pensée du son.”

The point is not simply that the two sides are connected. Their relation is constitutive of the linguistic entity itself. Saussure therefore locates linguistic analysis on what he calls the “borderland” where the elements of the two orders combine: “la linguistique travaille donc sur le terrain limitrophe où les éléments des deux ordres se combinent.” What results from this combination is, in his formulation, “une forme, non une substance.”

The metaphor consequently answers the question left open by the sheep and the metal plate. The linguistic unit is not a composite object assembled from two independently complete parts. Its unity emerges at the point where the two orders are articulated. Their difference remains necessary to the structure, while their separation would destroy the linguistic entity under consideration.

The comparison also clarifies why this articulation belongs to Saussure's account of langue. The system is not a container in which already constituted elements happen to coexist; its units arise through the articulation of the two orders. The linguistic form belongs to that articulation rather than to either side considered independently.

Once the sign has been understood in this way, however, another question remains. Even an inseparable association between an acoustic image and a concept does not explain why a particular linguistic unit has the value it has. For that, the unit must be considered within the system to which it belongs.

4. Unity Within the System

Saussure's discussion of value adds this further dimension. A term may appear to be fully determined if we describe it as the association of a particular sound with a particular concept, but such a description isolates it from the system that gives it its linguistic significance. The identity of a sign cannot therefore be established solely by examining what is associated within it.

Value arises from the relations among signs. A sign occupies a position within a structured field of differences, and its particular determination depends on that position. The association of its two sides gives it its internal constitution, while its relations with other signs determine its place within the system.

The sign is therefore constituted through the association of an acoustic image and a concept, while its value depends on its relations with the other units of the language. Its internal constitution and its position within the system belong to the same linguistic organization. The sign cannot be understood as a self-sufficient object outside that network of relations, any more than its two sides can be separated without changing the entity they constitute.

Saussure's conception of value thus completes the problem raised by the sheep and the metal plate without resolving it by reducing its duality. The linguistic unit is not made homogeneous by being incorporated into a system. Rather, the system provides the relational conditions under which a unit with two distinct sides can function as a linguistic entity at all.

Conclusion — A Unity That Is Not Simplicity

The sheep with its metal plate captures the peculiar character of the linguistic unit. A linguistic entity cannot be treated as a simple homogeneous object because its constitution involves two distinct orders. The sheet of paper shows how these dimensions can nevertheless form a unity: they are distinguishable, yet their separation would destroy the linguistic form. Value then situates that unity within the larger system of relations through which linguistic identity is determined.

The progression from langage to langue, and from langue to the sign, therefore leads to a conception of unity that does not depend upon homogeneity. Langue provides the organized field in which linguistic entities can exist as such; the sign is constituted through the articulation of two distinct sides; and value determines its place within the system. What initially appears as an awkward combination of unlike elements turns out to be characteristic of linguistic structure itself.

For Saussure, the problem is not how to eliminate duality, but how to understand a system whose units achieve their unity through the articulation of what remains distinct.

References

Saussure, F. de. (1983). Course in general linguistics (C. Bally & A. Sechehaye, Eds.; R. Harris, Trans.). Open Court. (Original work published 1916)

Saussure, F. de. (1993). Saussure’s third course of lectures in general linguistics (1910–1911): From the notebooks of Émile Constantin (E. Komatsu, Ed.; R. Harris, Trans.). Pergamon Press. (Original lectures delivered 1910–1911)

Saussure, F. de. (2006). Writings in general linguistics (S. Bouquet & R. Engler, Eds.; C. Sanders & M. Pires, Trans.). Oxford University Press. (Original work published 2002)