The course gives a quick overview of the history of linguistics. The following problems are treated: different definitions of the  language, the common speech and the special languages, R. Jakobson's linguistic functions, theories of sign (by F. de Saussure and Peirce) , the morphosyntactic system (Europaean functionalism, American structuralism), the theory of the sign  (signification,  linguistic value, the semiological triangle ,  semantic fields etc.) the semantic system and the pragmatics (language acts, enunciation, discourse, presuppositions and implied information etc.).

Credit: assiduity, 2 tests passed.

Written examination  in the winter session.