Deconstruction
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| - | :The term ''deconstruction'' was coined by French philosopher [[Jacques Derrida]] in the 1960s and is used in contemporary humanities and social sciences to denote a philosophy that deals with the ways that meaning is constructed and understood by writers, texts, and readers. One way of understanding the term is that it involves discovering, recognizing, and understanding the underlying — and unspoken and implicit — [[worldview|assumptions, ideas, and frameworks]] that form the basis for thought and belief. It has various shades of meaning in different areas of study and discussion, and is, by its very nature, difficult to define without depending on "un-deconstructed" concepts. | ||
| - | '''Deconstruction''' is a term in [[contemporary philosophy]], [[literary criticism]], and the [[social sciences]], most closely associated with the work of [[Jacques Derrida]], although the term does not originate in Derrida in a strict sense. The term denoting a process by which the texts and languages of [[Western philosophy]] (in particular) appear to shift and complicate in [[meaning]] when read in light of the assumptions and absences they reveal within themselves. | + | '''Deconstruction''' ({{lang-fr|déconstruction}}) is a form of [[Semiotics|semiotic]] analysis, derived mainly from French philosopher [[Jacques Derrida]]'s 1967 work ''[[Of Grammatology]]''. Derrida proposed the deconstruction of all texts where [[binary oppositions]] are used in the construction of meaning and values. The first task of deconstruction, starting with philosophy and afterwards in literary and juridical texts, would be to overturn all the [[binary oppositions]] of metaphysics (signifier/signified; sensible/intelligible; writing/speech; passivity/activity; etc). According to Derrida, deconstruction should traverse a phase of "overturning" these oppositions. |
| - | Subjects relevant to deconstruction include the philosophy of [[meaning]] in Western thought, and the ''ways'' that [[meaning]] is constructed by Western writers, texts, and readers and understood by readers. Though Derrida himself denied deconstruction was a method or school of philosophy, or indeed anything outside of reading the text itself, the term has been used by others to describe Derrida's particular methods of textual criticism, which involved discovering, recognizing, and understanding the underlying—and unspoken and implicit—assumptions, ideas, and frameworks that form the basis for thought and belief, for example, in complicating the ordinary division made between nature and culture. Derrida's deconstruction was drawn mainly from the work of [[Heidegger]] and his notion of ''[[Heideggerian terminology#Destruktion|destruktion]]'' but also from [[Levinas]] and his ideas upon the [[Other]]. | + | To do justice to this necessity, deconstruction starts from recognizing that in a classical philosophical opposition readers are not dealing with the peaceful coexistence of a vis-a-vis, but rather with a violent hierarchy. One of the two terms governs the other ([[axiological]]ly, logically, etc.), or one of the two terms is dominant (signified over signifier; intelligible over sensible; speech over writing; activity over passivity; male over female; man over animal, etc). To deconstruct the opposition, first of all, would be to overturn the hierarchy at a given moment. To overlook this phase of overturning would be to forget the conflictual and subordinating structure of opposition. |
| - | Perhaps the two most formative influences on deconstruction are the work of [[Martin Heidegger]] and [[Sigmund Freud]]. Derrida's earliest work was a series of essays printed in the early 1960s which were collected into the book ''[[L'écriture et la difference]]'' (''[[Writing and Difference]]''), which appeared in [[1967]] with two monographs, ''[[De la grammatologie]]'' (''[[Of Grammatology]]'') and ''[[La voix et la phénomène]]'' (''[[Speech and Phenomena]]''). These works (in particular the essays "Force and Signification," "Cogito and the History of Madness," and "Structure, Sign, and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences") included a major re-evaluation of the structuralist movement then dominant in French academe and may be considered [[poststructuralism]] avant la lettre. | + | The final task of deconstruction is not to surpass all oppositions; because it is assumed that they are structurally necessary to produce sense, they cannot be suspended once and for all. They need to be analyzed and criticized in all their manifestations; the function of both logical and [[axiological]] oppositions must be studied in all [[discourse]]s to provide meaning and values. Deconstruction does not only expose how oppositions work and how meaning and values are produced in a [[Nihilism|nihilistic]] or [[Cynicism (philosophy)|cynic]] position, "thereby preventing any means of intervening in the field effectively". To be effective, and simply as its mode of practice, deconstruction creates new notions or concepts, not to synthesize the terms in opposition, but to mark their difference, undecidability, and eternal interplay. |
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| - | As Derrida explained in his "Letter to a Japanese Friend" (''Derrida and Differance'', eds. Robert Bernasconi and David Wood) the French word "déconstruction" was his attempt both to translate and re-appropriate for his own ends the Heideggerian terms '[[Destruktion]]' and '[[Abbau]]' via a word from the French language, the varied senses of which seemed consistent with his requirements. | + | |
| == Jacques Derrida's reception in the United States == | == Jacques Derrida's reception in the United States == | ||
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Deconstruction (Template:Lang-fr) is a form of semiotic analysis, derived mainly from French philosopher Jacques Derrida's 1967 work Of Grammatology. Derrida proposed the deconstruction of all texts where binary oppositions are used in the construction of meaning and values. The first task of deconstruction, starting with philosophy and afterwards in literary and juridical texts, would be to overturn all the binary oppositions of metaphysics (signifier/signified; sensible/intelligible; writing/speech; passivity/activity; etc). According to Derrida, deconstruction should traverse a phase of "overturning" these oppositions.
To do justice to this necessity, deconstruction starts from recognizing that in a classical philosophical opposition readers are not dealing with the peaceful coexistence of a vis-a-vis, but rather with a violent hierarchy. One of the two terms governs the other (axiologically, logically, etc.), or one of the two terms is dominant (signified over signifier; intelligible over sensible; speech over writing; activity over passivity; male over female; man over animal, etc). To deconstruct the opposition, first of all, would be to overturn the hierarchy at a given moment. To overlook this phase of overturning would be to forget the conflictual and subordinating structure of opposition.
The final task of deconstruction is not to surpass all oppositions; because it is assumed that they are structurally necessary to produce sense, they cannot be suspended once and for all. They need to be analyzed and criticized in all their manifestations; the function of both logical and axiological oppositions must be studied in all discourses to provide meaning and values. Deconstruction does not only expose how oppositions work and how meaning and values are produced in a nihilistic or cynic position, "thereby preventing any means of intervening in the field effectively". To be effective, and simply as its mode of practice, deconstruction creates new notions or concepts, not to synthesize the terms in opposition, but to mark their difference, undecidability, and eternal interplay.
Jacques Derrida's reception in the United States
As early as 1968 Derrida lectured in the United States of America and formed a number of relationships which led to visiting appointments at American universities including Johns Hopkins, Yale University, and University of California, Irvine. It is often accepted that Derrida's influence was greatest in America, whereas in France Derrida was never granted any formal position of the greatest prestige. Derrida's early association with Paul de Man, established in 1968, led to the latter's consideration as the leading practioner of "American deconstruction". De Man's student Gayatri Spivak helped provide early exposure of Derrida's work to English-language readers. Derrida collaborated closely with his translators, many of whom went on to be prominent commentators and interlocutors, including Samuel Weber, Peggy Kamuf, Geoffrey Bennington, and Avital Ronell.
See also
