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This document provides a critical analysis of Jacques Derrida's concept of the "double deconstructive reading." It discusses the tension between the two parts of the deconstructive reading - the first reading reproduces the author's intended meaning, while the second reading deconstructs that meaning. The analysis questions whether it is possible to both attain a stable, determinate meaning in the first reading and also deconstruct that meaning in the second reading without contradiction. It examines Derrida's justification for the possibility of a "relatively stable" structure that can be destabilized through deconstruction.
This document provides a critical analysis of Jacques Derrida's concept of the "double deconstructive reading." It discusses the tension between the two parts of the deconstructive reading - the first reading reproduces the author's intended meaning, while the second reading deconstructs that meaning. The analysis questions whether it is possible to both attain a stable, determinate meaning in the first reading and also deconstruct that meaning in the second reading without contradiction. It examines Derrida's justification for the possibility of a "relatively stable" structure that can be destabilized through deconstruction.
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This document provides a critical analysis of Jacques Derrida's concept of the "double deconstructive reading." It discusses the tension between the two parts of the deconstructive reading - the first reading reproduces the author's intended meaning, while the second reading deconstructs that meaning. The analysis questions whether it is possible to both attain a stable, determinate meaning in the first reading and also deconstruct that meaning in the second reading without contradiction. It examines Derrida's justification for the possibility of a "relatively stable" structure that can be destabilized through deconstruction.
Droits d'auteur :
Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
Formats disponibles
Téléchargez comme PDF, TXT ou lisez en ligne sur Scribd
Journal ofthe British Societyfor Phenomenology, 35, 3, October 2004
JACQUES DERRIDA'S DOUBLE DECONSTRUCTIVE
READING: CONTRADICTION tERMS?
The present essay constitutes a critical appraisal of Derrida' s deconstructive double reading. This appraisal highlights a certain tension between the two different "gestures" that deconstructive reading: namely, between the first reading (a reading that reproduces or "doubles" authorial or textual intention) and the second reading (a reading that deconstructs the meanings that have been detennined and identified the first reading). general position is that the absence an extra-linguistic foundation for meaning, all textual meaning "js exceeded or split by the intervention of that is, by a dissemination irreducible to polysemy." et, while such a position renders possible the deconstruction of semantically determinate and identifiable claims the second reading), renders impossible the attainment of such claims the first reading).
Deconstructive as Double Reading. the chapter entitled "The Exorbitant. Question of Method", Derrida notes that deconstructive reading situates itself the gap between what the author "commands" within her text (her "vouloir-dire") and what she does not "command", that is, what takes place her text without her will. This distance, fissure or opening is something that deconstructive reading must "produce" (OG 158/DLG 227).1 et, order produce this fissure or opening, deconstructi ve reading must first reproduce what the author "wants-to-say", something that requires the submission to classical reproductive reading practices. The reading (namely the reproduction the authorial or textual intention) is then destabilised through th6 utilisation <?f all those elements that have refused be incorporated within Hence, the meanings produced during this first reading become "disseminated" the second reading. other words, during this second reading the text loses its apparent semantic detenninacy, organized around the axis its authorial intention, and is eventua1ly pushed into producing a number of incompatible meanings which are "undecidable", the sense that the reader lacks any secure ground for between them. For example, Plato 's Pharmacy,2 Derrida exhibits the way which the text of Phaedrus, despite Plato' s keep the two opposite meanings of - namely the meanings of "remedy" and "poison" - separate, ends affinning fois both. 283 deconstructive reading, therefore, contains both a "dominant",3 \ reproductive ading and a reading. The first reading, which ca11s a "doubling redoublant"J (OG 158/DLG 227), finds a passage "lisible" and understandable, and reconstructs the determinate meaning of the passage read according to a procedure that the deconstructive reader shares with comrnon readers. The second reading, which he calls a "critical reading" or an "active interpretation", goes the meanings that the first reading has already construed. this double reading or ."double gesture" ["double geste"],4 is obliged to use classica1 and practices at the same time, to negate their power to "control" a text, to construe thorougWy a text as something detenninate, and "disserninate" the text into a series of "undecidable" meanings. The tension Derrida' s "double" interpreti procedure is rather apparent. Deconstruction can only subvert the meaning of a text that has already been construed. order for a text' s intentional meaning to become destabilised, the text needs to possess a certain stability so that it can be rendered In Derrida describes this "doubling commentary" - the initial detennination or reading that the deconstructive operation focuses - as the deciphering of the "fm(" pertinen( or competent access to structures that are relatively stable hence destabilizable.1), and from which the most venturesome questions and interpretations have to ..." [italics added] 145/"Postface" 268) The expression "relatively stable (and hence destabilizable!)", the paradoxica1 presuppositions of the determination of the metaphysical text has to be since the destabilising force of deconstruction can take place only something that possesses a certain stability whilst simultaneously being order for deconstruction to be possible .. Initia11y, seems to be justified arguing that a certain structure, though stable t is potentially destabilisable: stability is not an irnmutability" 151/"Postface" 279). Change is ineliminable, possibility. Yet, Derrida those reasons for the destabilization of a certain textua1 structure which would preclude (even "relative") stability to Therefore, the question that is whether it is possible to think together the possibility stable determinations and meaning as "dissemination" a non-contradictory manner? But how does Derrida justify the possibility of the stable" structure of the "doubling commentary? For him, the analysis of the constitution of meaning undertaken the part of and condensed the statement that "[ t ]he absence of the transcendental signified extends the domain and the play of signification infinitely", 5 does not 284 constitute an obstacle to the existence of stable or determinate meanings. the contrary, differance - a neologism which coins order to under1ine the fact that meaning is the product of the endless differential play of language - is not presented as a constitutive but rather as "render[ing] both possible and necessary" 149/"Postface" 275). Differance is the playful which produces the differences that are for words and conceptualisation general: "Differance is the systematic play of differences, of the traces of differences, of the spacing by means of which elements are related to each other" 27IPOS 38).6 Derrida' s differance constitutes the radicalization of Ferdinard de Saussure's structurallinguistics and, particular, of the determination of the sign as arbitrary and differential. Saussure, a linguistic sign "connects not a with a name but an idea with an acoustic image"7 or, respectively, a "signified" with a "signifier" this sense, the elements the linguistic sign are not physical but mental. The bond between the and the Saussure tells US, is not natural, but instituted or So, signs are "arbitrary" within the system of language and only within this system. The signs of language are not autonomous ideas and sounds which exist independently of the linguistic system. These ideas and sounds are simply elements of a linguistic system, and have the status conceptual and phonic differences produced from this system itself. sign has meaning through the position which occupies within a chain of conceptual and phonetic differences. As Saussure declares: a language, there are on1y differences" (CLG 166). These differences are not differences already formed acoustic images ideas: language there are only differences without terms" (CGL 166). that respect, language is' not a system of identities but a systematic structure differences. Derrida infers from Saussure' s position the arbitrary and differential character of the sign that it is impossible "that a simple element be present and of itself, to itself' 26IPOS 37). Signs do not reflect pre existing meanings. The possibility of any signification is dependent a silent system of differential references. this sense, order for any present element to signify it must refer to another element, different from itself, that is not present. Denida meaning as a process of signification which functions according to this pattem and, thus, that the idea of the capacity to grasp the essence or the meaning of a sign - a true presence - is an illusion. Since the signified is its full plenitude, the structure of the sign is always already simultaneously marked by difference and 285 presence. Derrida coins the neologism describe the difference, or the being-different of these differences, the "production" as well as the "contamination" of each present element by something which is not present. The substitution of the "e" of "difference" by the "a" of from the present participle reca11s the French verb differer. The verb differer has two seemingly quite distinct meanings which are drawn from the Latin verb differere. The double meaning of the French differer is rendered English by the different verbs "to differ" and "to defer". Hence, differer, the sense of the verb "to differ", signifies difference as lack of resemblance between two things, distinction, lack of identity, or discemibility, while, differer, the sense of the verb "to defer", "the interposition of delay, the interva1 of a spacing and that puts off until 'later' what is presently denied, the possible that is presently impossible".8 Hence, for Derrida, does not obstacle that would prevent someone from making determinations regarding a text' s In fact, we are told, is the condition of possibility and impossibility' of meaning: while it makes meaning present, it excludes it from present. the non-identity of with itself, this has not the slightest effect the establishment of a text' s intentional meaning, as often argues e!llphatically in opposition to all those who, he are misinterpreting him when characterising deconstruction as "henneneutic (e.g. John Ellis )9: "this process of and meaning differing from themsel does not negate the possibility of commentary'" (''AfteIWord'' 147/"Postface"). this sense, "doubling commentary" does not differ radically from other reconstructions of a text' s authorial intentions. As himself confesses: ''And you are saying that these 'practical for interpretation' are 'not so threatening to conventional modes of reading'" 147/"Postface" 271). All those readers, who would "hastily" conclude that the radical view of language and meaning put forward the first part of fundamentally overtums all our traditional of and reading, would find themselves filled with when in the second part, the section entitled "The Exorbitant. Question of Method", they are suddenly prompted to "respect all the classical exigencies" and "all the instruments of traditional (OG 158IDLG 227) the same spirit, "Afterword: Towards an Ethics of Discussion", Derrida cautions against reading as equivalent to "indeterminacy" : do not believe have ever spoken of whether in regard to 'meaning' or anything else. Undecidability is else again ... undecidabi1ity is always a 286 determinate oscillation between possibilities (for example, of meaning, but also of acts). These possibilities are themselves highly determined in strictly defined situations (for ex ample, discursive - syntactical - but also political, ethical, etc.). They are pragmatically determined. The analyses that have devoted undecidability concern just these and these defmitions, not at all some vague ...Which is to say that from the point of view of semantics, but also of ethics and tics, 'deconstruction' should never lead either to relativism or to any sort of indeterminism. be sure, in order for structures of undecidability to be possible (and hence structures of decisions and of responsibilities as well) , there must be a certain play, differance, of but of differance or of nonidentity with oneseIf the very process of Differance is not indeterminacy. It renders determinacy both possible and necessary. ("Afterword" 148-9/"Postface" 273-4) Hence, does not seem question the attribution "relatively stable" meanings to words and, by extension, to texts themselves. This is what allows to be able to decide, for example, whenever Plato uses the equivocal word pharmakon whether he means either "remedy" or "poison". The "essential" or "undecidable" equi vocity of the word pharmakon is another nature. It lies the text' s refusa1 to decide, against its author' s intentions, favour the identification the word with one its two opposite meanings (thus the pharmakon is described as "undecidable"). The text does not refuse determine different meanings for the word pharmakon; it refuses to decide favour the one or the other. . et, differance "is not indetenninacy", it "renders both possible and necessary" thereby allowing a text to possess a "relative stability", then what is it that renders the deconstruction these "relatively stable" determinations possible? The answer is again: Differance. those elements previously as the production of meaning play, difference, differance - are a1so invoked to justify the deconstruction of that "effect" meaning wmch the differentia1 play itself has produced. order justify the possibility a text's deconstruction, turns the turbulent effects of differance, which, however, were previously declared as constituting an the attainment those stable textual determinations which are now subject deconstruction. The differential play, by preventing a concept' s meaning to be "fully present (present itself, its signified, to other)" (OG 8IDLG 17), is now posed as that wmch pushes the concepts (see, for example, the concept pharmakon) - and by extension the text its entirety - into "undecidability". The same "play", which did not previously prevent concepts from possessing a relatively stable meaning. If, as Simon Glendinning writes, "the necessity 'play' ensures that any putative 'unity meaning' is priori 'dispersed' advance",ll then which stability of meaning, even relative, is possible begin from? If the term "dissemination"12 is another name for the "play", which, for conceptual identities, then, the stability 287 of meaning that the "doubling commentary" requires seems its possibility undermined. fal1s a paradox when he presents this "play" or the constant slipping of entities their passage into their opposites as a perpetual of properties - as limited "a oscillation between ... highly determined possibilities", without any effect the process of the of these possibilities. If there is a certain or 144/"Postface" 266) the process of as himself declares, how then is determination possible the fonn required by the "doubling commentary"? mterprets the effects of the differentia1 constitution of concepts will. the extent that deconstruction needs the "doubling commentary", the constitution of a sign' s meaning or identity through its differences from other does signs or concepts from carrying with them, at the of their use, a certain, stable" load of meaning (something that, according Derrida, allows the existence of stable determinations of a text's as that of his "doubling commentary"). the other when needs to explain and justify how the deconstruction of this "doubling commentary" is made possible, he a certain or indetermination that was able to open the space of my for example, that of the word supplement" [italics added] 144/"Postface" 266).13 Thus, Derrida seems to "remain blind" to the consequences of 'the existence of this ."play or relation to the possibility of "doubling commentary" itself. The "hesitation" that exhibits regard to the exact role that plays within reading - a hesitation imposed by the prerequisites of dbuble reading - forces him into contradictory statements such as when, the one hand, he explicit1y refers to a certain "p"lay in order to justify the possibility of deconstruction, while the other hand, he claims that "1 do not 1 spoken of 'indetenninacy', whether in regard to 'meaning' or else .. . is not indeterminacy" ("Afterword" 148/"Postface" 273). Yet, a third passage declares again that ]nce again, that was possible only if a non-self-identity, a a opened the space of this history" (italics added) 145/"Postface" 267). Thus, due to the paradoxical presuppositions of reading, a11 descriptions will to oscillate uncertainly between the need for the of stable and the possibility of their 11 Interpreting Authorial 1ntention. contradiction with what he says about the endless play between concepts, the fissure that effects the 288 core of presence, the sign which is just a "trace", the "residue" of meaning which is just meaning falling short of itself or the of meaning in general, treats or textua1 intention (a text's vouloir-dire) as something which can be determined univocally. And this seems to flow from the necessary prerequisites of deconstruction itself. Deconstruction is installed between a text's intended meaning (its layer) and the text itself (its descriptive layer). If a text' s authorial intention was not fixed and then it would be difficult for deconstruction juxtapose against it contradictory elements found the same text. 14 Thus, contrary to the text as a whole, which treats as heterogeneous and or textual intention is presented as a1ways coherence,15 homogeneity, and as being by lack of ambiguity. Derrida treats the text, during its first reading, as if only one of intention were possible. He examines the possibility, (without being theoretically able to preclude such a possibility), that other interpretations of intention are also possible. The aim of this is protect the effectiveness of the strategy of deconstruction. If accepted, even potentially, that other interpretations of a text' s were possible, then he could preclude the possibi1ity that other, non-metaphysica1 determinations of a text' s intentional meaning could be feasible, that would not thus be dire need of deconstruction. This, in tum, would affect his whole "narrative" about "Westem metaphysics," which is by the spffit of an interpretation of the texts of the philosophical tradition, thereby it of much of its credibility. if he conceded the possibility of the existenc,e of other plausible interpretations, either metaphysical or (although this is something that he could know then the deconstruction of merely one out of this potential plethora of plausible interpretations would have only a limited significance and effectiveness. The kind of certainty about a text' s that deconstruction requires is possible only if authorial meanings are pure, solid, "self identical" facts which can be used to anchor the work. However, this way of conceiving meaning is direct opposition to deconstruction, for which meaning is impossible to of a fixed entity or substance. author' s intention is itself a complex 'text', which can be debated, translated and interpreted just like any other text 143/"Postface" 265). Derrida, for all his harsh criticism of organicist concepts, seems paradoxica1ly to share the prejudgement that philosophica1 texts, at least if only at an initial are integrated wholes, as if the of the work resides the author' s However, there is, fact, reason why the author should not have had severa1 mutua11y contradictory 289 or why her intention may not have been somehow self contradictory. This is actua11y a possibility that Denida does not consider at all. The way which appear texts does not necessarily a consistent whole, and it may be unwise to rest this assumption too heavily, particularly, if one speaks, as does, about intention as an effect." There is absolutely need to suppose that or textua1 intention either do or should 'constitute hannonious wholes. this sense, s stance towards a text' s (i.e. its could be described as juridical: anything which cannot be herded inside the enclosure of 'probable' meaning is brusquely expelled, and everything remaining within that enclosure is strictly subordinated to this single goveming intention. Under such an approach, authorial are order to be replaced with a stable meaning. They must be "normalised". Such a "doubling commentary" of or textual intentions is obliged to render mutually coherent the greatest number of a work' s elements. it would not be "exorbitant" to attribute to his treatment of or textual intention, the same accusations he to the metaphysical tradition conceming the way which it treats texts as unified wholes: 111 Conclusion. could have limited himself the less ambitious (and also less ambiguous) claim that concepts and texts do not constitute vehicles or containers of present meanings. Of course, he would not be the first philosopher to make such a claim. Moreover, such a claim would not necessarily exclude the of the existence of "re1atively stable" it would exclude only the of perfectly meanings. 16 et is not with merely doubting univocity. He wants to do something bigger: to He thus takes the step of arguing that the absence of an extra-linguistic foundation for our linguistic practices the "dissemination" of construed meanings into "undecidability" is endless. Now the possibility of deconstruction arises, but a certain anomaly its "double" interpretive procedure seems arise too: text must be read order to be disseminated into an "undecidability" that never breaks completely free of its initial detennination. Deconstruction can only subvert the of a text that has already been construed So, what does deconstruction ultimately favour: or needs to decide 17 whether promotes stability meaning (even a relative one) or "dissemination." He cannot utilise both possibilities simply because deconstruction needs them both. 18 University of Crete, Greece 290 References 1. Grammatology, trans. Gayatri C. (Baltimore: John Hopkins Press, 1976 (OG) / De (Paris: Les Editions de 1967), (DLG). 2. Jacques "Plato's trans. Barbara Johnson, (Chicago: Cbicago University Press, 1981) (D) "Le Pharrnacie de Platon" Collection (paris: Editions de Seuil, 1972) (DIS). 3. Deaida cal1s this initial reading that deconstruction enacts the text "dominant interpretation" ("interpr6tation dominant") [J. Toward an Ethic of Discussion" in Limited Inc, trans. S. Weber, (Evaston, ll..: Northwestem Press, 1988), 143 / "Postface: Vers une ethique de discussion" in Limited Znc, Les Editions de Minuit, 1972), 265 ("Postface")]. 4. Jacques "Signature, Event, Context" Limited Znc, op.cit., / "Signature Evenement Contexte" de philosophie, Les Editions de Minuit, 1972),
5. Jacques "Structure, Sign and Play the Discourse of Human Sciences" Writing Difference, trans. Alan Bass, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1978), 280/ "La structure, le signe et 1e jeu dans le discours de sciences humains" Ecriture et Difference, de Seuil, 1967), 411. 6. Jacques Positions, trans. Alan Bass, (London: The Athlone Press, 1987) / Positions, (paris: Les Editions de Minuit, 1972) (POS). 7. Ferdinard de Saussure, Cours de linguistique (Paris: Payot, 1973), 98 (CLG). 8. Jacques "Differance" Philosophy, trans. Alan Bass, (London: Harvester Wbeatsheaf 1982), 3 / "La differance" in de philosophie, Les de Minuit, 1972, 3. 9. JoOO Ellis, Deconstuction, (Princeton, N.J.: University Press, 1989),
10. The part of is presented by as a matrix", while the second part Derrida' s deconstructive reading of Ro.usseau' s Essay and the Con/esswns) is presented as an "example" of the fust part: "The firsr part of this book, 'Writing before the Letter,' sketches broad outlines a theoretical matrix. It indicates certain moments, and proposes certain concepts. These critical concepts are put the test the second part, 'Nature, Culture, This is the' moment, as it were, of the example, although strictly speaking, that is not acceptable within my argurnent." (OG lxxxixIDLG 7) 11. Simon Glendincing, Being with Others:' Wittgenstein, (London: Routledge, 1999), 81. 12. Explaining the term "dissemination", Gayatri Chacravorty Spivak mentions the following: a false etymological kinship between and semen, offers this version of textuality: sowing that does not produce plants, but is simply inficitely repeated. 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", Jacques . While Ricbard Harland adds: must be from univocity or the state of single meanings by the the writer' s mind; but it must also be distinguished from polysemy or the state of multiple maintained by the in the reader's mind. is the state of perpetually unfulfilled meaning that exists the absence of all signifieds." (Richard Harland, Superstructuralism: The Philosophy Structuralism & New York: Methuen, 1987, 135). 13. In the next page of the Towards an Ethics of Discussion", the possibility of the deconstruction of "doubling commentary" refers once more a indeteoninacy" within as a prerequisite for the possibility of any 291 deconstruction: "[o]nce again, that was possible only if a non-self-identity, a differance and a opened the space of this violent history" (italics added) 145/"Postface" 267). 14. In the declares consistency with what he thinks about language and meaning that "'doubling is not a moment of simple reflexive recording that would the originary and true layer of a text's a rneaning that is and self-identical" (italics added) 143/"Postface" 265). However, in practice, treats the "doubling" of a text's intention according those that he denounces above. Indicative of this is the fact that from his multiple readings, hesitation is cornpletely absent. 15. Por example, in "Violence and Metaphysics", declares that "[w]e will refuse to the self-coherent unity of intention [l'unit'e fidele soi de l'intention] to the which then would be more than pure disorder." (1. "Violence and Metaphysics" Writing Difference, 84). 16. This position would be also content with a certain conception of differance: while differance makes meaning present, excludes from being present. 17. In "Structure, Sign, and Play the Discourse of the Human Sciences", when he refers to two different "Interpretations of interpretation", the structuralist of a meaning and the Nietzschean affmnation of play, which can be compared respectively with the two different kinds of interpretation that deconstructive "double" reading itself, Derrida declares that do not that today there is any question of choosing - the first place because here we are a region (let us say, provisionally, a region of where the category of choice seems particularly (1. "Structure, Sign, and .... ", Difference, 293). Even if is accepted that this declaration does not constitute attempt to escape from adequate justification of the paradoxical demands of deconstructi ve reading, what are the interpretive resources that Derrida has utilised order to reach such an assertion about the kinds of interpretation prevailing today as well as today's regarding choice? 1s such an assertion made from either the side of or playful Does not such an assertion violate what Demda about choice? 18. would like to thank Dr Peter Langford for his invaluable help. 292