We have just considered the notion of ‘classical semiology’, and the methods and techniques by which Derrida brings semiology into the framework of classical metaphysics. The centrepiece of evidence in that ef ort was Roman Jakobson's testimony, cited by Derrida in Of Grammatology and in ‘Semiology and Grammatology’, that the medieval theorisation of the sign has been adopted by Saussure and the structuralist science of signs. This evidence is used by Derrida to posit a metaphysical epoch reaching from Aristotle to Augustine to Saussure, governed by the conceptuality of the sign. Within such an epoch, the more homogeneous the concept of the sign becomes, the less originality can be granted to Saussure. This chapter attempts to establish the originality which Derrida grants to Saussure within the epoch of the sign. As we shall see, such originality stands or falls on the status of Saussure's theory of linguistic value. While Derrida never explicitly addresses this theory, his comments on Saussure's maintenance of ‘a transcendental signified’ would seem to neutralise the possibility of such a theory, as Saussure describes it.

Evidence for Derrida's view of Saussurean originality

What is the evidence for determining Derrida's position on the originality of Saussure?