This paper tends to deal mainly with Derrida’s both essays of "Structure, Sign and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences" and "Différance". It tries to show some of his key ideas and his outstanding status in the postmodern school of thought in the light of his aforementioned essays.
The first things that come to our minds when we hear the name of Jacques Derrida are Deconstruction, Différance, Post-structuralism, Post-modernism, Writing and Differance, Of Grammatology and so on. This illustrates that we are already familiar with Derrida. However, the majority of people complain about Derrida’s complexity of his writings as well as the difficulty of translating his works. One of the most illustrative examples is the preface of Gayatri Chakravorti Spivak to Derrida‘s "Of Grammatology" in which she states "when the preface is being written by someone other than the author, the situation is yet further complicated. A pretense at writing before a text that one must have read before the preface can be written".
Spivak’s statement is a real example of the inseparable relationship between reading and writing. Reading is breathing in whereas writing is breathing out. Alan Bass, a translator of Derrida, suggests that the difficulty to read Derrida is not a question of his style of writing but rather Derrida challenges the way we are used to read. Besides, Alan Bass compares the translator of Derrida to a psychoanalyst in the sense that the translator must understand the syntax and lexicon of the original text in order to transform it through his own language. This is quite analogous with the attempt of the psychoanalyst to translate the language of dreams into a latent language.
Contents
1. Introduction
2. Structure, Sign and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences
2.1 Anti-Structuralism
2.2 Decentering the center
3. Différance
3.1 Against the definition of différance
3.2 Deconstruction
4. Conclusion
Aims and Themes
This paper examines Jacques Derrida’s essays “Structure, Sign and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences” and “Différance” to explain key ideas associated with his place in postmodern thought. It considers how his questioning of structures, centers and stable meaning relates to post-structuralism and deconstruction.
- Structuralist theories of language and culture
- Derrida’s critique of centered structures
- Signification, difference and the trace
- Nietzsche’s influence on post-structuralist thought
- Deconstruction as an approach to reading
Excerpt from the Book
3.1 Against the definition of différance
One of the main distinctions between structuralism and post-structuralism is that the origins of structuralism are deeply rooted in linguists, a discipline through which we can reach reliable truths. Whereas post-structuralism inherits the skeptic habit of philosophy.14 Therefore, Derrida associates skepticism with his neologism of différance15. In his essay Différance, which appears on his book, Margins of Philosophy, Derrida states that Différance is neither a word nor a concept. It has neither existence nor essence. Moreover, the “a” in différance is written and read. However, it cannot be apprehended in speech. Thus, this “a” is not heard and it remains silent as a tomb. Différance is polysemic. In a footnote to his translation of Derrida’s Margin of Philosophy, Alan Bass compares différance to Hegel’s Aufhebung. In the process of dialectics, Aufhebung negates and lifts up concepts to a higher sphere in which they are conserved.16 As with Hegel’s Aufhebung, the translation of a word with double meaning is difficult. Therefore, both concepts are usually left untranslated.
Différance is an allusive essay. It refers to multiple thinkers including Hegel, Saussure, Hesserl, Levinas, Deleuze, Freud and Lacan. Nevertheless, the neologism of Différance is based mainly on the works of Nietzsche and Lévinas especially at the level of signification where “différance brings the two notions of differing and deferring together … repeatability and otherness”17. Both notions of repetition and otherness come from Nietzsche’s eternal recurrence and Lévinas’s idea of the responsibility of the other.
According to Derrida, différance and anti-trace are the same. “the concept of trace is incompatible with the concept of retention, of the becoming-past of what has been present. One cannot think the trace–and therefore, différance–on the basis of the present or the presence of the presence … since the trace is not a presence but the simulacrum of a presence.”18 Sign dislocates itself and therefore it has no site.
In her preface to Derrida’s Of Grammatology, Spivak argues, “Derrida does not reject Heidegger’s master word Being, which Heidegger usually crosses out but his French word trace carries it with the implication of track, footprints and imprint. Therefore, it cannot be a master word. Moreover, she suggests that the structure of the sign is determined by the trace or track of that other, which is forever absent. This other is of course never to be found in its full being as consulting the dictionary”19 That is, one synonym leads you to another.
Chapter Summaries
1. Introduction: The introduction considers the difficulty of reading and translating Derrida and identifies the two essays at the center of the paper.
2. Structure, Sign and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences: This chapter introduces structuralist ideas associated with Saussure and Lévi-Strauss before discussing Derrida’s critique of centered structures and the influence of Nietzsche.
3. Différance: The chapter explores différance, the trace and their relationship to signification. It also discusses deconstruction and approaches to reading associated with Derrida and Paul De Man.
4. Conclusion: The conclusion reflects on criticism of Derrida’s writing and on his influence on post-structuralist and postmodern thought.
Keywords
Jacques Derrida, post-structuralism, structuralism, différance, deconstruction, signification, trace, centered structures, free play, Saussure, Lévi-Strauss, Nietzsche, Paul De Man
Frequently Asked Questions
What is this paper about?
It examines two essays by Jacques Derrida and introduces ideas associated with his post-structuralist thought.
What are its central themes?
Its themes include structuralism, the critique of centered structures, différance, the trace and deconstructive reading.
What is the paper’s primary aim?
It aims to explain key ideas in the two essays and discuss Derrida’s place in postmodern thought.
What scholarly method does the paper use?
The paper offers a conceptual discussion of Derrida’s essays in relation to other thinkers and critical sources.
What does the main discussion cover?
It moves from structuralism and Derrida’s critique of the center to différance and deconstruction.
Which keywords characterize the paper?
Key terms include post-structuralism, signification, différance, trace, free play and deconstruction.
How does the paper connect Nietzsche with Derrida?
It discusses Nietzsche’s critique of metaphysics, eternal recurrence and the death of God in relation to Derrida’s account of decentered structures.
Why does the discussion mention Paul De Man?
It presents his Allegories of Reading as an example of deconstructive reading and discusses his approach to textual analysis.
- Citation du texte
- Issam El Masmodi (Auteur), 2019, The key ideas of Jacques Derrida in his essays "Structure, Sign and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences" and "Différance", Munich, GRIN Verlag, https://www.grin.com/document/510094
