References
- Jacques Derrida, Of Grammatology, trans. Gayatri C. Spivak, (Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 1976 (OG)/De la Grammatologie, (Paris: Les Éditions de Minuit, 1967), (DLG).
- Jacques Derrida, “Plato's Pharmacy” in Dissemination, trans. Barbara Johnson, (Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1981) (D) “Le Pharmacie de Platon” in La Dissemination, Collection “Essais”, (Paris: Éditions de Seuil, 1972) (DIS).
- Derrida calls this initial reading that deconstruction enacts on the text “dominant interpretation” (“interprétation dominant”) [J. Derrida, “Afterword: Toward an Ethic of Discussion” in Limited Inc, trans. S. Weber, (Evaston, IL: Northwestern University Press, 1988), p. 143 (“Afterword”)/“Postface: Vers une éthique de discussion” in Limited Inc, (Paris: Les Éditions de Minuit, 1972), p. 265 (“Postface”)].
- Jacques Derrida, “Signature, Event, Context” in Limited Inc, op.cit., p.21/“Signature ÉvÉnement Contexte” in Marges de la philosophie, (Paris: Les Éditions de Minuit, 1972), p. 392.
- Jacques Derrida, “Structure, Sign and Play in the Discourse of Human Sciences” in Writing and Difference, trans. Alan Bass, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1978), p. 280/“La structure, le signe et le jeu dans le discours de sciences humains” in Ecriture et Différence, (Paris: Éditions de Seuil, 1967), p. 411.
- Jacques Derrida, Positions, trans. Alan Bass, (London: The Athlone Press, 1987) (P)/Positions, (Paris: Les Éditions de Minuit, 1972) (POS).
- Ferdinard de Saussure, Cours de linguistique générale, (Paris: Payot, 1973), p. 98 (CLG).
- Jacques Derrida, “Différance” in Margins of Philosophy, trans. Alan Bass, (London: Harvester Wheatsheaf 1982), p. 3/“La différance” in Marges de la philosophie, Paris: Les éditions de Minuit, 1972, p. 3.
- John M. Ellis, Against Deconstuction, (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1989), p. 134.
- The first part of Of Grammatology is presented by Derrida as a “theoretical matrix”, while the second part (i.e. Derrida's deconstructive reading of Rousseau's Essay and the Confessions) is presented as an “example” of the first part:
- “The first part of this book, ‘Writing before the Letter,’ sketches in broad outlines a theoretical matrix. It indicates certain significant historical moments, and proposes certain critical concepts. These critical concepts are put to the test in the second part, ‘Nature, Culture, Writing.’ This is the moment, as it were, of the example, although strictly speaking, that notion is not acceptable within my argument.” (OG Ixxxix/DLG 7)
- Simon Glendinning, On Being with Others: Heidegger-Derrida-Wittgenstein, (London: Routledge, 1999), p. 81.
- Explaining the term “dissemination”, Gayatri Chacravorty Spivak mentions the following: “Exploiting a false etymological kinship between semantics and semen, Derrida offers this version of textuality: A sowing that does not produce plants, but is simply infinitely repeated. A semination that is not insemination but disseminaton, seed spilled in vain…Not an exact and controlled polysemy, but a proliferation of always different, always postponed meanings.” (G. S. Spivak, “Translator's Preface”, in Jacques Derrida, Of Grammatology, o.p., lxv). While Richard Harland adds: “Dissemination must be distinguished from univocity or the state of single meanings maintained by the signified in the writer's mind; but it must also be distinguished from polysemy or the state of multiple meanings maintained by the signified in the reader's mind. Dissemination is the state of perpetually unfulfilled meaning that exists in the absence of all signifieds.” (Richard Harland, Superstructuralism: The Philosophy of Structuralism & Post-Structuralism, New York: Methuen, 1987, p. 135).
- In the next page of the “Afterword: Towards an Ethics of Discussion”, explicating the possibility of the deconstruction of “doubling commentary” Derrida refers once more to a “relative indeterminacy” within determination as a prerequisite for the possibility of any deconstruction: “[o]nce again, that was possible only if a non-self-identity, a différance and a relative indeterminacy opened the space of this violent history” (italics added) (“Afterword” 145/“Postface” 267).
- In the “Afterword”, Derrida declares in consistency with what he thinks about language and meaning that ‘“doubling commentary’ is not a moment of simple reflexive recording that would transcribe the originary and true layer of a text's intentional meaning, a meaning that is univocal and self-identical” (italics added) (“Afterword” 143/“Postface” 265). However, in practice, Derrida treats the “doubling” of a text's authorial intention according to those terms that he denounces above. Indicative of this attitude is the fact that from his multiple readings, hesitation is completely absent.
- For example, in “Violence and Metaphysics”, Derrida declares that “[w]e will refuse to sacrifice the self-coherent unity of intention [l'unité fidèle à soi de l'intention] to the becoming which then would be no more than pure disorder.” (J. Derrida, “Violence and Metaphysics” in Writing and Difference, o.p., p. 84).
- This position would be also content with a certain conception of différance: while différance makes meaning present, it excludes it from being absolutely present.
- In “Structure, Sign, and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences”, when he refers to two different “interpretations of interpretation”, the structuralist deciphering of a meaning and the Nietzschean affirmation of play, which can be compared respectively with the two different kinds of interpretation that comprise deconstructive “double” reading itself, Derrida declares that “I do not believe that today there is any question of choosing—in the first place because here we are in a region (let us say, provisionally, a region of historicity) where the category of choice seems particularly trivial” (J. Derrida, “Structure, Sign, and….”, Writing and Difference, op.cit., p. 293). Even if it is accepted that this declaration does not constitute an attempt to escape from an adequate justification of the paradoxical demands of deconstructive reading, what are the interpretive resources that Derrida has utilised in order to reach such an assertion about the kinds of interpretation prevailing today as well as today's situation regarding choice? Is such an assertion made from either the side of deciphering or playful interpretation? Does not such an assertion violate what Derrida says about choice?
- I would like to thank Dr Peter Langford for his invaluable help.