Glossematics

/ˌɡlɒsɛˈmætɪks/ noun

Definition

A linguistic theory developed by Louis Hjelmslev that analyzes language as a formal system of minimal meaningful units called glossemes.

Etymology

From glosseme plus -atics (study of), coined by Danish linguist Louis Hjelmslev in the 1940s, from Greek glōssa and a new -eme suffix inspired by phoneme.

Kelly Says

Glossematics is famously difficult to understand—even linguists struggled with it—but it influenced modern structural linguistics by treating language like an abstract mathematical system.

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