In this wide-ranging and accessible introduction, internationally known linguist, psychoanalyst, and theorist Julia Kristeva presents the evolution and emergence of linguistics as human science. She traces postmodern linguistic theory back to its roots, using sources that range from Egyptian hieroglyphics, Mayan and Phoenician writings, and the Hebrew Bible to the Prague School of Structuralism. Thorough and far-reaching in its analysis, Language: The Unknown provides fascinating insights into the history of graphic cultures, philosophy, anthropology, and semiotics.

For Kristeva, the object of linguistic investigation is not "What is language?" but rather "How can language be thought?" In a series of carefully documented analyses informed by the theories of Levi-Strauss, Saussure, Benveniste, Freud, and Lacan, Kristeva describes the history of thought as a phenomenon that links philosophical speculation to linguistic practice.