LOUIS TROLLE HJEMSLEV

Louis Trolle Hjelmslev (Danish: [jlmsle]; October 3, 1899, Copenhagen May 30, 1965,
Copenhagen) was a Danish linguist whose ideas formed the basis of the Copenhagen School
of linguistics. Born into an academic family (his father was the mathematician Johannes
Hjelmslev), Hjelmslev studied comparative linguistics in Copenhagen, Prague and Paris (with
a.o. Antoine Meillet and Joseph Vendryes). In 1931, he founded the Cercle Linguistique de
Copenhague. Together with Hans Jrgen Uldall he developed a structural theory of language
which he called glossematics, which developed the semiotic theory of Ferdinand de Saussure.
Glossematics as a theory of language is characterized by a high degree of formalism, it is
interested only in describing the formal characteristics of language, and a high degree of
logical rigour. The theory never became widely influential, but has recently been picked up by
post-structuralist philosophers as a possible alternative to the dominant Saussurean linguistic
paradigm.[1][2]

The Linguistic Circle of Copenhagen

The Linguistic Circle of Copenhagen was founded by Hjelmslev and a group of Danish
colleagues on 24 September 1931. Their main inspiration was the Prague Linguistic Circle,
which had been founded in 1926. It was, in the first place, a forum for discussion of
theoretical and methodological problems in linguistics. Initially, their interest lay mainly in
developing an alternative concept of the phoneme, but it later developed into a complete
theory which was coined glossematics, and was notably influenced by structuralism.
Membership of the group grew rapidly and a significant list of publications resulted, including
an irregular series of larger works under the name Travaux du Cercle Linguistique de
Copenhague. A Bulletin was produced, followed by an international journal for structuralistic
research in language, Acta Linguistica (later called Acta Linguistica Hafniensia), which was
founded with the members of the Prague Linguistic Circle. It was, at that time, the sole
journal explicitly dedicated to structuralism. With one short break from 1934 to 1937, while
he lectured at the university of Aarhus, Hjelmslev acted as chairman of the Circle until shortly
before his death in 1965.[3]

Theoretical work
Hjelmslev published his first paper at the age of 25. His first major book, Principes de
grammaire gnrale, which he finished in 1928, is an invaluable source for anyone interested
in Hjelmslev's work. During the 1930s Hjelmslev wrote another book, La catgorie des cas,
which was a major contribution to linguistics. In this book, Hjelmslev analysed the general
category of case in detail, providing ample empirical material supporting his hypotheses. It is
important to read Hjelmslev's work as a continuous evolving theory on the epistemology of
linguistics.
His most well-known book, Omkring sprogteoriens grundlggelse, or in English translation,
Prolegomena to a Theory of Language, first published in 1943, critiques the then-prevailing
methodologies in linguistics as being descriptive, even anecdotal, and not systematising. He

proposed a linguistic theory intended to form the basis of a more rational linguistics and a
contribution to general epistemology. Like Ferdinand de Saussure (18571913), he accepted
language as a system of signs, from the point of view of language use. He argued that a theory
of semiotics should be consistent within itself, comprehensive, and as simple as possible.[4]

Hjelmslev's sign model

Hjelmslev's sign model is a development of Saussure's bilateral sign model.[5] Saussure
considered a sign as having two sides, signifier and signified, and also distinguished between
form and substance. Hjelmslev's famously renamed signifier and signified as respectively
expression plane and content plane.[5][6][7][8] The combinations of the four would distinguish
between form of content, form of expression, substance of content, and substance of
expression.[5] In Hjelmslev's analysis, a sign is a function between two forms, the content form
and the expression form, and this is the starting point of linguistic analysis. However, every
sign function is also manifested by two substances: the content substance and the expression
substance. The content substance is the psychological and conceptual manifestation of the
sign. The expression substance is the material substance wherein a sign is manifested. This
substance can be sound, as is the case for most known languages, but it can be any material
support whatsoever, for instance, hand movements, as is the case for sign languages, or
distinctive marks on a suitable medium as in the many different writing systems of the world.
In short, Hjelmslev was proposing an open-ended, scientific method of analysis as a new
semiotics. In proposing this, he was reacting against the conventional view in phonetics that
sounds should be the focus of enquiry. Some[who?] have interpreted his work as if Hjelmslev
argued that no sign can be interpreted unless it is contextualisedtreating his functives,
expression and content as the general connotative mechanisms (for instance by Algirdas Julius
Greimas) -- for Hjelmslev the point of view of the linguist on meaning is that of the form of
content. Even if the content substance is important, one has to analyse it from the point of
view of the form. Not only do pictures and literature manifest the same organising principles,
but, more broadly, seeing and hearing, though certainly not identical, interact in surprisingly
complex ways at deeper levels of the sign hierarchy which Hjelmslev sought to understand.[9]

Assessment
Hjelmslev made a bold proposal to transform technical analysis into a broad enquiry,
emphasising that the true focus of linguistics should be the language and the human culture
that continually reinvents it, and all society's memory of its accumulated knowledge preserved
through language. This was a challenging but constructive argument at the time, and remains
one that still has relevance today. Most conspicuously, Hjelmslev's lines of inquiry have been
taken up by Gilles Deleuze and Flix Guattari (see the "Postulates of Linguistics" and
"Geology of Morals" chapters of A Thousand Plateaus), and subsequently their followers.

Terminology
Hjelmslev introduced the terms glosseme, ceneme, prosodeme and plereme as linguistic units,
analogous to phoneme, morpheme etc.[10]
Also, his most famous work, Prolegomena to a Theory of Language, is mostly concerned with
the formal definition of a terminology for the analysis of any level of a system of signs, and as
such there exists an exclusively Hjelmslevian terminology for that.