Some Remarks on Antoine Meillet’s Approach to General Phonetics

Abstract

This paper deals with some works published by Meillet in Nineteenth-Nineties. They indicate his approach to phonetics, which denotes both a Saussurean imprint suggested by the concept of the système de sons as a système où tout se tient and a concern with the experimental and descriptive research of the time. His views on phonetic change and the role of phonetic laws and tendencies come from this approach.