ABSTRACT
This chapter present in an organic manner the key concepts developed by Gramsci in regard to the problem of language, often neglected in Marxist literature. Marxists themselves admit that linguistics and most problems related to language have been almost exclusively the concern of non-Marxist sciences. As a matter of fact, very little has been written on the subject by the founders of Marxism. Two pronouncements by Marx and Engels have generally been considered the basis for the elaboration of a Marxist analysis of language. Gramsci is among the few Western Marxist theorists to take an active interest in the study of language and arrive at a general theory of language, not dissimilar from contemporary structural linguistics. The idealist philosophy of Croce was no doubt the reigning philosophy in Italy. It dominated all fields of inquiry, particularly history, philosophy, aesthetics, literature, art and language.
