In linguistic anthropology, arbitrariness is the principle that there is no inherent or natural connection between a linguistic sign (a word) and the meaning it stands for. The link between a signifier and its signified is set by convention, not logic.
Arbitrariness means a word's form has no built-in reason to mean what it means. There is nothing dog-like about the sounds in "dog," which is why French speakers say chien, German speakers say Hund, and Swahili speakers say mbwa for the same furry animal. The connection between the signifier (the sound or written form) and the signified (the concept) is fixed by a community's shared agreement, not by nature.
This idea sits at the center of Ferdinand de Saussure's structuralist view of language. Because signs are arbitrary, language is wildly flexible: communities can coin new words, retire old ones, and shift meanings over time without being tied down to any "natural" form. That flexibility is one reason humans can talk about abstract ideas (justice, infinity, last Tuesday) that no fixed, instinctive call could ever capture. A small set of exceptions exists, like onomatopoeia ("buzz," "meow"), but even those vary across languages, which shows arbitrariness is still doing most of the work.
Arbitrariness shows up in Topic 6.1, The Emergence and Development of Language, where you compare human communication to that of birds and other primates. Animal calls tend to be fixed and tied to specific situations, but human language is open-ended precisely because its signs are arbitrary. That openness is what lets us combine sounds into endless new words and meanings. Understanding arbitrariness helps you explain why the world holds thousands of mutually unintelligible languages and why language can keep evolving to fit a community's changing needs. It also connects the biological story (brain structure, vocal tract) to the cultural story of how humans create and share meaning.
Keep studying Intro to Anthropology Unit 6
Visual cheatsheet
view galleryLinguistic Sign (Unit 6)
The linguistic sign is the whole unit made of a signifier plus a signified, and arbitrariness is the rule describing how loosely those two parts are joined.
Ferdinand de Saussure (Unit 6)
Saussure made arbitrariness a foundational principle of structuralist linguistics, arguing meaning comes from convention and difference rather than any natural fit.
Language Families (Unit 6)
Because signs are arbitrary, the same concept gets totally different word forms across the world, which is why historical linguists group languages into families by tracking those shifting forms.
Duality of Patterning (Unit 6)
Arbitrariness pairs with duality of patterning as a design feature of human language: meaningless sounds combine into meaningful units whose forms are not tied to their meanings.
Expect to define arbitrariness and give a clear example, usually by showing the same concept expressed by different word forms across languages. On short-answer or essay questions, you may be asked to use it to explain why human language differs from animal communication, or to connect it to Saussure's signifier and signified. In discussion or on quizzes, you should be able to label the signifier, name the signified, and explain why their bond is conventional rather than natural. Watch for prompts that ask you to identify which design features (like arbitrariness and duality of patterning) make language flexible and creative.
Arbitrariness is about the loose link between a word's form and its meaning. Linguistic relativity is a separate claim that the language you speak shapes how you think and perceive the world. One is about the sign itself; the other is about language's effect on thought.
Arbitrariness means there is no natural reason a particular word form maps to a particular meaning; the link is set by convention.
It is a core principle of Ferdinand de Saussure's structuralist theory, describing the bond between signifier and signified.
The thousands of different words for the same thing across languages are direct evidence that signs are arbitrary.
Arbitrariness gives human language its flexibility, letting communities create new words and shift meanings over time.
Onomatopoeia is a partial exception, but even those words vary across languages, so arbitrariness still dominates.
It means there is no inherent or natural connection between a word's form and what it means; the relationship is agreed on by a speech community. That is why English says "tree" while Spanish says "árbol" for the same plant.
No. Words like "buzz" or "meow" imitate sounds, but they still differ across languages (a Japanese cat says "nyan"), so even imitative words are shaped by convention rather than being fully natural.
Arbitrariness is about the loose, conventional link between a word and its meaning. Linguistic relativity is the separate idea that your language influences how you think and see the world.
Because signs are arbitrary, language is open-ended and creative, which lets humans invent new words, express abstract ideas, and adapt their languages over time in ways fixed animal calls cannot.
Ferdinand de Saussure made it a central principle of structuralist linguistics, describing how the signifier (the form) and signified (the concept) are joined only by convention.