Applied Linguistics and Linguistics

The rapid growth of the field of applied linguistics over the last twenty years has led to a general observation that applied linguistics must be viewed as an interdisciplinary. Modern Linguistics necessarily begins with the work of Ferdinand de Saussure and his General course on linguistics. Sausure introduced distinctions such as synchronic vs diachronic (historical) analyses of language, and language vs parole. These latter two influential notions evolved from the structural assumptions on the nature of language. de Saussure's work had a powerful impact on various structural-linguistics groups that emerged across Europe, including the London School of Linguistics, the Geneva School of Linguistics, the Copenhagen School of Linguistics, and the Prague School of Linguistics. They also explored functional uses of language in sentences and discourse and had a significant impact on Chomsky's later theories through Roman Jakobson.