or semiology
Study of signs and sign-using behaviour, especially in language.
In the late 19th and early 20th century the work of Ferdinand de Peirce led to the emergence of semiotics as a method for examining phenomena in different fields, including aesthetics, anthropology, communications, psychology, and semantics. Interest in the structure behind the use of particular signs links semiotics with the methods of {{link=structuralism">structuralism . Saussure's theories are also fundamental to poststructuralism .