Abstract

This paper aims at investigating the reception of Ferdinand de Saussure’s definition of linguistic sign in Italy after the publication of the Cours de linguistique générale. On this matter, Mario Lucidi and Walter Belardi have played a prominent role in the dissemination and criticism of the theory proposed by Saussure, which heated a lively debate among scholars. Indeed, according to their mentor Antonino Pagliaro’s teachings, Lucidi and Belardi have revisited the Saussurean sign and provided a new definition of linguistic sign as “utterance-signµ. Therefore, the paper deals with the relationship between Saussure’s work and the theory developed by Lucidi and Belardi.