This week, Saussure told us that "in language there are only differences without positive terms". This explain that whether we have the signifier or the signified, neither exist outside of one another. We need black and white, boy and girl, yes and no. One can only be defined with its negative, but how the meaning has come to be over time is altered by reality. For example, in class we discussed AIDS and how a few decades ago, the disease was perceived as only contracted between homosexual males, and today people think and know how anyone anyone can get it.
Post-structuralism is a bit different in that these opposites do not give the full meaning of the signified and signifier. The meaning of words keep being deferred, and the true meaning is unknown.
Take money for example. Is the idea of money, or having money actually having the bills and coins, or is it now represented based on appearance of material items? I think the idea of money comes in so many different forms today from not having any, to having it, to showing it off, to watching the stock market plummet.
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