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Syntagma and Paradigm
For Saussure, the interaction between syntagma and paradigm—associa-
tive relations—was crucial to understanding language. Syntagmatic and
paradigmatic relations constituted linguistic structure and determined
how the language functioned (Saussure 1916/1983, 126). In contrast to
the “interpenetration of morphology, syntax and lexicology”:
Only the distinction earlier drawn between syntagmatic relations and associa-
tive relations suggests a classification which is indispensable, and which fulfils the
requirements for any grammatical systematisation. (Saussure 1916/1983, 135)/
In a development from the indispensability of the distinction, Saussure
insisted:
Everything in a given linguistic state should be explicable by reference to a theory
of syntagmas and a theory of associations. (Saussure 1916/1983, 135).
From the perspective of modernity influenced by computational technolo-
gies, transformations on language involved in retrieval should be equally
explicable by the reference to the syntagma and paradigm. We have
already indicated the possibility of significant explication, understanding
that creation of a full-text index involves tearing a word from its syn-
tagma and releasing it into the paradigm. We also understand retrieval as
reentering a variety of syntagmas.
In his Course in General Linguistics, Saussure is more concerned with
paradigm and language than syntagma and utterance (1916/1983; Harris
1987, 125). Prioritizing language and paradigm implies objectification
of human activity. In earlier neglected and difficult work on anagrams,
the syntagma and its patterns of variation—conceived at various levels
of granularity—received preferential attention (Starobinski 1979). In this
context, the usual order of mention and consideration—paradigm before
syntagma—is reversed, thus preserving the probable order in human his-
tory of activity and perception. The individual utterance is given priority
over language as a whole (Vološinov 1929/1986), and the syntagma is
regarded as an abstraction from its prior practical instantiation in oral
speech occurring over time and written language extending across space.
We can regard the paradigm, particularly as a network of associations, as
a further abstraction, produced by the variety of syntagmatic occurrences
of words. Finally, we will investigate the analytic value of the interaction
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