D. V. Demidov

participate in the expression of the meaning of the units of upper 
levels; they are called ―cortemes‖ (from Lat. cortex: ‗bark, crust, 
shell‘) as opposed to the majority of meaningful lingual units, 
called ―signemes‖. 
The systemic nature of grammar is probably more evident 
than that of any other sphere of language, since grammar is 
responsible for the very organisation of the informative content of 
utterances [2, p. 9-11]. Due to this fact, even the earliest 
grammatical treatises, within the cognitive limits of their times, 
disclosed some systemic features of the described material. But the 
scientifically sustained and consistent principles of systemic 
approach to language and its grammar were essentially deve loped 
in the linguistics of the twentieth century, namely, after the 
publication of the works by the Russian scholar Beaudoin de 
Courtenay and the Swiss scholar Ferdinand de Saussure. These two 
great men demonstrated the difference between lingual synchrony 
(coexistence of lingual elements) and diachrony (different time-
periods in the development of lingual elements, as well as language 
as a whole) and defined language as a synchronic system of 
meaningful elements at any stage of its historical evolution. 
On the basis of discriminating synchrony and diachrony, 
the difference between language proper and speech proper can be 
strictly defined, which is of crucial importance for the 
identification of the object of linguistic science.

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14 
3. Language and Speech. 
Language in the narrow sense is a system of means of 
expression, while speech should be understood as the 
manifestation of the system of language in the process of 
intercourse. 
The system of language, includes, on the one hand, the 
body of material units – sounds, morphemes, words, word-groups; 
on the other hand, the regularities of ―rules‖ of the use of these 
units. Speech comprises both the act of producing utterances, and 
the utterances themselves, i.e. the text. Language and speech are 
inseparable, they form together an organic unity. Language and 
speech are inseparable, they form together an organic unity. As 
for grammar (the grammatical system), being an integral part of 
the lingual macrosystem it dynamically connects language with 
speech, because it categorially determines the lingual process of 
utterance production. 
Thus, we have the broad philosophical concept of 
language which is analysed by linguistics into two different 
aspects – the system of signs (language proper) and the use of 
signs (speech proper). The generalising term ―language‖ is also 
preserved in linguistics, showing the unity of these two aspects 
[2, p. 16]. 
The sign (meaningful unit) in the system of language has 
only a potential meaning. In speech, the potential meaning of the 
lingual sign is "actualised", i.e. made situationally significant as