Structural semantics examines the relationships between the meanings of terms within language. It views meaning as composed of smaller structural units that are defined through social interactions, and may become meaningless without such contexts. Structuralism studies the underlying systems of signification that occur wherever there are meaningful events or actions, such as discussions, texts, or social practices, and views meaning as a product of shared signification systems rather than private experience. Ferdinand de Saussure's semiotic theory analyzed how elements of language relate synchronically in a system, with the basic unit of the sign composed of the signifier and signified.

1. STRUCTURAL SEMANTICS
• Relationships between the meanings of terms
within a sentence
• How meaning can be composed from smaller
elements
• Meaning are divided into smaller structural
units via its regulation in concrete social
interactions
• Outside of these interactions language may
become meaningless

2. • Presented to: -
• Prof. Rao Jalil
• Presented by: -
• Maqsood Ahmad
• ID# 12011084006
• University of Management and Technology
• Johar Town Lahore, Pakistan.

3. CONT.
• Structuralism is
• Wide range of discourses
• Study underlying structures of signification
• Signification occurs wherever there is a
practice of
• Meaningful events
• OR
• Meaningful actions

4. CONT.
• Meaningful events might include any of
following
• Writing or reading a text
• Getting married
• Having a discussion over a cup of coffee
• A battle
• Meaningful events involve
• Either a document or an exchange

5. CONT.
• According to structuralism
• Meaning is not a private experience
• As Husserl thought
• It is a product of a shared system of
signification

6. FERDINAND DE SAUSSURE
• Language is a system of inter related units
and structures
• Every unit of language is related to the
others within the same system
• Focused not on the use of language (parole
or talk)
• But on the underlying system of language
(langue)

7. FERDINAND DE SAUSSURE
• Called his theory semiotics
• His approach focused on examining
• How the elements of language related to
each other in the present
• ‘Synchronically' rather than ‘Diachronically'.

8. SIGN:
• According to Saussure
• The basic unit of language is a sign
• A sign is composed of
• Signifier (a sound image or its graphic equivalent)
• Signified (the concept or meaning)
• For example: -
• Letters p-e-a-r functions as a signifier
• Producing in the mind of English speakers the concept
(signified) of a certain kind of rosaceous fruit, a pear.

9. CONCLUSION: -
• Things are not always what they seem
• Idealist claim of structuralism can be
understood in the following way:
• Reality and our conception of it are
"discontinuous".
• Language pre-exists us
• It is not we who speak
• As Heidegger was to say
• but "language speaks us".