Saussure calls language a "system of signs," not merely just a naming system. While we do assign words to material things, a naming system would exclude words for ideas, relationships, etc. The signs, or words, are not the objects they express. When you look at a menu, you are looking at words, or signs, that represent the food, or ideas. You aren't looking at the actual food.

              Saussure breaks this down into sound-image (signifier) and the concept (signified). Saussure proposes using signifier and signified in lieu of sound-image and concept because the former are more easily differentated both from each other and from the sign- their sum total.

              The signified is what is meant by the sign. Not the actual material thing itself, but the idea of the thing. The signifier is our mental impression of the word, or sign, itself.

              For an example: the word "sound" has many meanings, or concepts. The sound in "a sound education" is not the same "sound" in "Long Island Sound" or "The Sound of Music." Actually, none of them are the same. So, while the signifier, the mental impression of the sign is the same in the three, the signified, what the sign meant in each particular instance is different. We are able to determine which signified is intended by looking at the context in which it is used. P>