|
| |
“Café Différance
Semester 1 – Evening No. 2*
*
Transcript of a recording by Anna Shmerling (Fall –
2000)
Deconstruction is rooted in a
phenomenological tradition that becomes very focused in the work of Martin
Heidegger, when he speaks of the destruction of Western onto-theology.
Heidegger is very aware that the language he uses to subject this history to
destruction is the very language that is to be de-constructed. The ‘con’ – the bringing together, concatenation – is
something that breaks into the word ‘de-struction’ as
it is practiced by Jacques Derrida.
He is what one might call a Neo-Heideggerian.
The whole point of deconstruction is
that it is not a system, and it is not a philosophy as such. It is a very
powerful critical tool. One of the main ethical components of deconstruction is
that whatever is subjected to deconstruction is not engaged with as if it is a
combatant - it is not a case of two combatants battling it out with one
another. Deconstruction is a very fluid language, which insinuates itself
within the body of the language to be deconstructed, in other words – allows
that language to deconstruct itself. This means that in the use of the language
there is a certain irony. There is no meta-language, beyond the common language
that we are using, to which we can escape. We are, in a sense, prisoners of
language. The only thing that we can try to achieve is to be utopic (‘u-topos’ means ‘no place’).
A Student: If you start to educate a people, and you
deconstruct the language, they can’t speak.
Louis: Well, in a way. But, Socrates didn’t have a
problem with that.
There is much in deconstruction that
is like the maieutic technique, as practiced by Socrates in the Athenian market
place. This is a very classic procedure of not so much presenting an opposite
viewpoint, as inviting the other to clarify the meaning of their own language
and their own beliefs. If one is rigorous in this practice, one generally finds
that the other, who is very confirmed in their belief – which is accorded the
status of knowledge – actually reaches a point of confusion or, at least,
uncertainty. This is one of the primary reasons why Socrates was not
particularly popular amongst the elite of Athens. Basically, he does not so
much rob one of one’s voice, but of one’s certitude, of the comfort of
certainty. And, everyone wants the comfort of certainty – no one wants to live
in a state of anxiety.
Derrida, basically, invites us to do
this, and – in a very Nietzschean way – he invites us
to embrace it. The thing is that in his texts (especially in the early texts)
he is not very kind to the reader, and this has been a subject of much debate.
A great deal of criticism has been aimed at Derrida, as if it is his intention
to confuse. He falls away from the ideal hermeneutic principle (Gadamerian principle) that in speech, in discourse – one
‘wants to be understood.’ It has sometimes been claimed that Derrida, in fact,
does not want to be understood – that he wants to confuse, and that this is not
an authentic philosophic attitude. Actually, this is a very ancient tradition,
but it is more refined in Derrida’s work – as I said, you can trace it back to
Socrates – and perhaps even further.
Derrida uses the expression ‘solicit’, and this means basically ‘to
shake foundations’. One must see this in reference to the reader of the Derridian text. What he wants to do is make you feel
uncomfortable – basically, he is making you do some of the work. The quote from
Derrida that I particularly like, and I always use it in his defense, is “One
must, above all, re-read those, in whose wake I write”.
Unfortunately, the tradition that
has emerged since Derrida’s early writing in the sixties (a deconstructive
tradition, which, as a tradition, is actually counter to the aims of
deconstruction) has developed a certain kind of canon. In a way, although
Derrida may assume that he gives us the first word on deconstruction, because
of some of the retroactive aspects of its historical movement, he doesn’t.
Neither does he give us the last word, because there are so many deconstructive
narratives that have emerged in the wake of his early writing, constantly repositioning
Derrida’s own writing in relation to the tradition that he deconstructs. The
history of deconstruction is constantly going through a process of transvaluation (which is also true of any history per se).
And, these days there is even talk of overcoming deconstruction. This is
absurd, because deconstruction shows us that there is no overcoming – in the
sense of ‘progress’ in the ideal sense. When Derrida himself maintains that we
have gone beyond phenomenology, or that we have gone beyond structuralism,
etc., there is no beyond. Basically, it is a question of a radical shift in
orientation on the same. This is about a re-positioning of oneself as reader
and assuming a more ironic attitude to the text. All that one can do,
basically, is engage with that which is to be deconstructed by inviting it to
dance at the limits of exhaustion. This is very significant in itself, but
there is nothing ‘beyond’ that limit of exhaustion. You can possibly push the
line out a little, but there is no stepping over that line.
A
Student: The question is whether you have to
control the language, when you do deconstruction, or not?
Louis: In a sense, language is
controlling you, writing itself through you, and you are unaware of it – this
is one of Derrida’s main points. The emphasis on irony and play in relation to
one’s language-use is to raise awareness about the limits of control.
A
Student: But, actually, you don’t have to know the
language, you just have to understand the other language...
Louis: Do you mean ‘how’ it works?… Is
that really enough?
A
Student: Okay, maybe you need to know more, but
you don’t have to learn it all…
Louis: Well, this is a singularly
instrumentalist point of view, and – fair enough, it has its place – this is
often at work in science. But, deconstruction signs a more philosophical
attitude.
Josef: The big point is – why deconstruction? It is all very
well. I mean, deconstruction is almost like a definition, but it has no ends,
no telos...
Louis: This is what Derrida says, but
it does. To be fair, deconstruction invites us to re-orient ourselves with
respect to the desire for a telos. Teleology is not
nullified, it is actually re-situated.
Josef: I know. But the point is: we deconstruct – all right. We
have very nice critics – all of them – Spinoza, Descartes, Husserl, etc. And
then comes Derrida and says ‘Let’s deconstruct’. I am saying ‘All right’ – now
we are deconstructing the believing in that which is deconstructed, or do we
deconstruct something else? I think that is what he meant, when he asked these
questions. What is the use of the movie? Shall we understand ourselves better,
maybe?
Mor: I think he wants to
confuse us, to shake our faith in the language of the telos,
and to be fresh.
Louis: We need to ask ourselves why
Derrida insists that we re-read those
in whose wake he writes.
This raises the issue of substitution. The theme
of substitution in deconstruction is fascinating. Basically, this is always
associated with the notion of simulacrum – again, in Plato. Simulacrum,
classically, is understood as ‘copy’ / ‘reproduction.’ In Plato, the ‘source’
of truth lies within a realm of hypostatized forms. The world of the everyday
is a mere shadow of this realm of light. The forms are the originary
source of truth, simplicity, harmony and economy. The term simulacrum
implicitly carries a distinction between originary
and secondary, since it is supposed to be a copy of something more original
(Let’s skip the history and get down to definition of terms). Basically, we
always work with the idea that first, there is an original presence, and then
it is re-presented. Derrida turns this hierarchy on its head. He says that
there is no original, there is no starting point, and there is no original source
point. This is very important. What he does is inaugurate a kind of
phenomenological shift within the realm of signification only. And, he plays within that realm – the realm of
signs – but a non-hypostatized realm. And, he demonstrates that since we operate
within language, we are informed by a network of signs. He draws from Ferdinand
de Saussure – his Course in General
Linguistics – by saying that language is not primarily made up of finite
units of meaning, but that language is fundamentally a system of differences.
Individuation first occurs out of the registration of difference and that this
is repeatable. Basically, it is only through the structure of repetition that
the process of individuation can take place; that meaning can, in fact, emerge.
This is because meaning not only has to be constituted it also has to be
sustained. If you think of a symbol – it is always in reference to something. One can return to that
symbol, and it refers you to the same thing again. There is a fundamental
repetitive element at work. And, it is this repeatability borne by language that allows the crystallization of
meaning. So, in a way, it is an a-semic space – it owes nothing to meaning. What Derrida
is doing is more structural, than that. But, his agenda is irreducible to the
re-statement of structuralism. The
one thing that Derrida takes very much into account, which structuralism tended
to underestimate, is time.
This brings us to the essay “Différance”. The neologism différance is the
name of a fascinatingly complex ‘stratagem.’ First of all, différance
is spelled with an ‘a’ in Derrrida’s essay. The point
is that the ‘a’ cannot be discerned phonetically in French. The difference only
announces itself through the graphic sign – you have to see it. Part of the
stratagem is to overturn what Derrida sees as a trace of something that has
been around since the dawn of philosophy – which is the precedence that is
given to the ‘voice’, live discourse; that writing is, in a sense, not exactly
a lie, but – in a platonic sense – a representation of something more original.
For Plato, the problem of truth is that something is always lost in this
process of representation. However, the very threat of the dissolution of
meaning – its loss – is also the condition of its possibility.
Now, from one point of view, Derrida wants to say that
the only reason we have meaning, tradition, science, civilization…is because of
the transmission, i.e., the ‘empirical’ transmission of the graphic sign, i.e.,
texts. We read, we learn, and we negotiate. So working within the significational domain and the graphic domain, Derrida is
basically saying that, in a sense, the graphic sign comes first.
This is a provisional step because Derrida is also
concerned to re-situate phenomenological discourse on sight. There are many
aspects involved in this stratagem. Derrida also wants to say, using the same
argument, that this classic notion of the immediacy of one’s own self-relation
is, again, a kind of myth – it is a construct. He follows in the tradition of
existentialist writing on alterity, in this sense. I
think that he is very much influenced by Levinas, in
particular. And, if we remember the influence of Ferdinand de Saussure’s
discourse on language as a system of diacritical differences… it is easy to see
that Derrida wants to be the champion of ‘difference.’ The employment of the strategem of différance is the announcement that there is no ‘originary presence’ and that there is no original and
immediate self-relation. Even one’s own self-relation is something that is
mediated through the Other – through alterity. And,
the structure of inter-subjectivity is, in many ways, identical to that of
intra-subjectivity. The inner communality of oneself is always a mirror of the
communality outside – in that it is a construct that owes everything to
language and tradition as the dissemination of language through writing.
Derrida wants to say that we are, in effect, nothing but the grafting of texts
upon texts upon texts… This is one of the reasons why he subjects the author to
a kind of erasure. The text writes itself, just as the author is a text that is
written through writing itself.
I really would like to show you the movie Deconstructing Harry, in which Woody Allen
picks up on this sense of writing. Harry is a guy who is constantly re-writing
his life. He lives it kind of ironically, precisely because he makes a living
out of writing. His life of writing is a life of deconstructing Harry (which is
a precise analogue to what Woody Allen has been doing throughout his whole film
career). A number of strange events occur to him over a very short period of
time. He is invited to appear at a school (from which he was thrown out as a
youth) by a group of scholars there who have really focused on his work and
wish to honour his writing. However, due to the fact
that Harry turns up with a hooker in his car, a corpse, and his kidnapped son
(for further details, see the film), he isn’t able to give his presentation.
At the end of the movie, Harry imagines himself
giving his address, while all the characters from his novels and short stories
are in attendance. There is a moment when he tries to express his feelings
about what they all represent to him, but he finds that he cannot adequately
articulate his meaning. So, the other professors, who are experts on his
writing, step in and, basically, say: “What he means to say is this…” As if, in
a sense, they are just as qualified to talk about the meaning of his writing,
and, perhaps, even more so, than the author himself. This is kind of a strange
and interesting notion, and I think that we are all familiar with it to a
certain extent.
So, what Derrida does is – he gives us a set of
rules, if you like, to play a game. So, we can see it as a game, but like in
any game – there are ‘rules’. Basically, over the next few weeks it would be
very useful to delineate what these rules are, so that we might begin to play a
bit ourselves, OK?
I have noticed that in this country one can learn about
Derrida’s writing, to a certain extent, mainly in architecture departments, art
departments, and literature departments, but in very few philosophy departments. My favourite
epithet for Monsieur Derrida is that he is ‘the bad boy’ of academic philosophy.
So, what I want to do is redress a certain balance. My agenda, for I freely
admit that I have one, is to present Derrida philosophically.
Now, Derrida is an extremely rigorous thinker. His first
three texts are very scholarly engagements with Husserlian
phenomenology. In 1954-1956 he worked on his MA Dissertation, which was only
published at the beginning of the nineties as The Problem of Genesis in Husserl’s Philosophy. It is absolutely
brilliant, and it has formed the basis of his very advanced discourse on the
‘limits of Husserlian phenomenology’. There is also
the discourse on Temporality in Derrida’s introduction to his translation of
one of Husserl’s shorter texts “The Origin of Geometry”, which is one of the
Appendices to The Crisis of European Sciences
(Edmund Husserl’s last unfinished manuscript). Five years after the publication
of his Introduction to Husserl’s “Origin
of Geometry”, Derrida published another book, entitled Speech and Phenomena, which takes up a diametrical opposition to
the orientation of his earlier text. He actually seems to undermine everything
about it. I like to call Speech and
Phenomena the ‘flip side’ or ‘dark side’ of his Introduction to Husserl’s “The Origin of Geometry”.
During that period of 12 or so years, Derrida achieved
such a high degree of expertise that he really could play around with
phenomenology as a phenomenologist.
And, although in my Ph. D. I often have a go at Derrida for some of the ways in
which he does this, I did it with my tongue firmly planted in my cheek –
because Derrida has quite a nerve. But, he is so well qualified. I cannot think
of any other philosopher, who is capable of doing that. Husserl is the master –
he is the philosophers’ philosopher, he is extremely difficult, very advanced
and very difficult to learn. His books require endless re-reading. When his
writing finally begins to make sense, and you experience that Freudean ‘Aha!’ – you are already halfway through your
life.
So, Derrida has actually taken a massive body of
work, and employed the rules very rigorously, and introduced a sense of irony
(that is also at work to a certain extent in Husserl, but is not thematized as such), and then he does something really
different with it. And, I cannot help feeling that Husserl would smile, because
there is an implicit invitation in Husserlian
phenomenology to go with Husserl beyond Husserl. ‘Beyond Husserl’, but not
beyond phenomenology. I don’t think you can do that. Although phenomenology is
an extremely radical and formidably rigorous discipline – or constellation of
disciplines – the point is that it is not a school. It is not a system in
itself. It is more like a set of tools, a very powerful language. And, Derrida
is a master who is basically playing around with it and showing us further possibilities.
In answer to your question… What do we do? When we
deconstruct the house – we may consider the house as a kind of text – what have
we got left? One might say that among other possibilities, we are left with an
architectural biography that is open to a multiplicity of different narrative
types of re-construction. The thing is that no reading is ever completely
exhaustive, and Derrida is the first one to tell us this. So, why is it that
Derrida says to us “One must, above all, re-read those in whose wake I write”?
Because he is reiterating this fundamental insight about inexhaustability
in reading. I can’t help feeling that he must be constantly amused by the
proselytizing Derridians who come along and say –
‘Derrida says this!’ and ‘Derrida says that!’ ‘Phenomenology has been
transcended, it is an old school, we don’t need to worry about it any more’… Actually, I wonder whether this makes Derrida
laugh or groan.
So, basically, we are going to accept his
invitation to re-read those in whose wake he writes. And, over the next few
weeks, beginning with “Différance,” which gives us a very clear outline of some of the essential
strategies in deconstruction, we are going to look at what Derrida actually
does with them. We are going to look at the way he attends to the work of
Husserl, Heidegger, Foucault, Sigmund Freud… Simultaneously with these papers,
I’ll present short pieces by the original writers (original? – if one can still
say such a thing), so that we can begin to play. We’ll look at what Derrida is
doing, and then re-read ourselves – see what the merits are in Derrida’s
deconstructive approach to these writers.
Another thing, as I said before, I occasionally want to show some movies
that are really good examples of phenomenology and deconstruction at work in
the media of film, which usually add up to some nice little existential motifs.
One of the things that I want to do is screen Alfred Hitchkock’s
Rear Window. What is particularly
outstanding about that movie, from a phenomenological point of view, is the way
in which we, the audience, are actually having the piss taken out of us (and
enjoying every moment of it). Hitchkock often liked
to do this. The whole film is basically about one guy (a travel photographer,
played by James Stewart), whose leg is broken, and all that he can do is sit at
his window with a pair of binoculars and look at what his neighbours
are doing. He only has certain glimpses of behaviour,
snapshots of interaction, ‘signs’ of events, but he is always going beyond them
in fierce speculation regarding their meaning, without being sure of their
actuality. So, his imagination runs wild. He assumes that a murder has taken
place, and for most of the film the audience is left in suspense regarding
whether it is simply his imagination. As it turns out – a murder has really
taken place.
The movie basically raises the issue of scopophilia
(which means ‘pleasure in looking’). To begin with, there are two aspects to scopophilia that we must be clear about. One form of
pleasure in looking is active and objectifies
the Other. This is very much at work in the famous slapstick style films of the
twenties – Chaplin, Keaton, Keystone Cops, etc. – comic movies that are often
quite cruel, in effect. You find yourself sitting there and laughing at other
people’s misfortunes. Sociologically, it marks an interesting phenomenon that
is at work in the Great Depression and all the rest of it…from “Buddy, can you
spare a dime?” to “I’m all right, Jack, because there is always someone else
who is worse off!”
There is another form of scopophilia, which
has a more interesting and cathartic aspect to it. This is when the narrative
of the film draws us into an intimate association with the scenario in the form
of a passive engagement with the Other – that is, the Other as subject. In a sense, you live through the Other – feel with the Other.
The different aspects of scopophilia in phenomenological discourse and in
existential discourse are fascinating. Of course, the two aspects that I’ve mentioned
only mark out the parameters of what is actually a vast spectrum of differences
between them. Alfred Hitchkock, in a sense, is
deconstructing this sphere when he is forces us, the audience, to look at what
‘we’ are doing, while watching this fellow, who is actually a voyeur, looking….
The I / Other dynamics of being-seen-seeing are fascinating in this movie
precisely for that reason.
I see this attitude very much at work in what Derrida does. Because, we,
as readers of philosophy, tend towards the kind of engagement with the text in
which we get drawn in. We are transported in learning the language that unfolds
through the narrative pathway of the
text. So…where are we, the readers? Derrida is always asking us to re-position
ourselves with respect to the text – which simultaneously requires that we
re-position ourselves in relation to ourselves. We must always maintain a kind
of malign vigilance, if you like. In a sense, he is restoring our
responsibility back to us. There is no writer, but there is always the
possibility of one, but it involves a certain kind of distance that arises out
of a sense of irony. Irony is the principal theme.
Now, when it comes to deconstructing our house and being left with
rubble, the one thing in deconstruction that gives us hope is that it has rent
apart the word de-struction by restoring the con of
de-con-struction.
The ‘con’ is the bringing together – which indicates that there is a
re-constructive possibility in deconstruction as a critical praxis. It is
irreducible to a merely nihilistic procedure. Basically, if one is to
understand the background logic of this, one has to go back to some of
Husserl’s later writing on genetic phenomenology, when he speaks of a movement
of Abbau,
which literally means ‘to unbuild’ or ‘deconstruct.’
The inverse correlate of that is Aufbau – which signs the possibility of a re-reconstruction.
However, if one starts out with an agenda…then one is in danger of
merely re-inventing the wheel. I often use Descartes as an example of this. He institutes
a process of systematic doubt, destroys everything, then arrives at the indubitability of the cogito
– and he reconstructs the world precisely as it was. The thing is that one
should not begin to unravel the world on the basis of some kind of reconstructive
telos
(i.e., ‘the world as it is’). One deconstructs it and then leaves it open as to
what type of narrative construction may suggest itself. A truly rigorous form
of deconstruction implies that one should not actually know where one is going.
This is something that Merleau-Ponty once said about
phenomenology. If it is to be rigorous in its project of maintaining a constant
dialogue with itself, then it must never know where it is going. By the same
token, Derrida, in the essay entitled “Différance,”
writes that the movement of deconstruction must embrace both “chance and
necessity”. So, there is no pre-established programme.
There is the possibility of a re-constructive turn, but – if we are to be
rigorous – we cannot speculate about this. All we can do is deconstruct and see
what happens. A singularly unscientific procedure, but that is what makes it
significant as a radical philosophical praxis.
Josef: When
you deconstruct something, you deconstruct something that has already been
constructed?
Louis: Yes.
Josef: Now,
deconstruction is sort of an incremental happening of something – which
‘happens by’ increments. I mean, you deconstruct something that has been
constructed – sometimes by one person, sometimes by many persons…
Louis: …but Derrida would
always say that one person is always, implicitly and explicitly, a member of a
community.
Josef: Yes,
of course. And then he said something which, at that time, the community
thought worth preserving. (I am not fighting, I am just trying to understand.)
But, Derrida seems to undermine this when he says that we cannot arrive at a telos and that there is no original presence to be
recovered…
Louis: We just arrive at the
trace – but it isn’t a trace of ‘anything’ any more.
Josef: It
is like deconstructing a chicken, but there is no chicken…. In a way, it is
very interesting because if you are a very intelligent and cultural person,
like most of the French with whom Derrida engages, you already have a very
profound and well-defined world of ideas. I don’t know if you have had many
relations with very educated French people, but they are really ‘very’ well
educated. If you want to know something about this – go and listen to some of
those Bernard Pivot evenings ("Bouillon De Culture"). They really
know what they are talking about. What Derrida says is – This is not enough! We
have to go around and see why they are so caught up in their ideas? What is
this culture that they are so full of? Is it not full of wind, but may it not
also be something real? All right, it is a very interesting exercise, but I
must say that, in a certain way, I think that we shall come to the conclusion
that even Derrida had something to say. But, this seems to be that there is
nothing more to be said…
Louis: There is everything to
be said.
Josef: I
don’t really know the difference between deconstruction and destruction. Maybe
we shall find out – I hope so.
Louis: Let us take a look at it
this way…I said that, in a way, deconstruction is to invite the subject of deconstruction
to dance at the limits of exhaustion. It is not to be invited to a duel, a
fight to the death. It is not about having a good workout, massaging one’s own
ego through disputation, or simply flexing the cerebral muscles in a very
French style, if you like.
I think that the usefulness of deconstruction extends beyond the arena
of simple confrontation. If you go back to the roots of deconstruction in
phenomenology – the roots, from a methodological
point of view – Edmund Husserl’s phenomenological epoché represents the very
subsoil. He introduced a
number of different forms of epoché throughout
his career, depending on what he was interested in looking at. In a way, what
Derrida has done is to have focused on the movement for its own sake. The epoché works like this –
it means ‘to cut’, and it also means ‘to suspend’. The first phenomenological
reduction is initiated in these terms. We live in a world that we take for
granted. We must endeavour to suspend this ‘natural
attitude’ in order to see how it stands out without having recourse to a
presupposed world-thesis. Such a thesis is to be bracketed. You might say that
dyadic ontology is still a ghost in the machine of Western analytical
philosophy. However, there are problems attached to the occasional
hypostatization of this dyad – the Cartesian legacy.
When we engage in the world, we engage in a world
of significance – it has meaning. Does that meaning simply exist in our minds?
When we are purely concerned with the relation between the psychic and the
physical as separate spheres, we run into all kinds of paradoxes. This is a
nexus of issues that has been passed down to us from Descartes and his dualism.
Basically, in phenomenology we are not supposed to
be concerned with such an ontological division or metaphysical divide, because
if we look at Descartes’ philosophy very carefully, we find that there is a
number of massive metaphysical leaps that he simply cannot ground. What is also
implicit in the notion of ‘res cogitans’ is that
consciousness is somehow imprisoned in a box. We are also left with the idea
that we don’t see reality, that we merely represent it to ourselves. This is
like a doubling of reality, images subsisting in our mind or head. It is an
‘image theory’, which is highly problematic. If one is aiming for an
independent criterion for the assessment of how accurately our representations
actually present reality as it is, one is left with an insoluble problem,
because one always has to ask oneself how it is possible to step outside experience
We have no recourse to an extra-experiential / independent criterion. We run
into Aristotle’s third man argument or an infinite regress – where verification
is always a matter of representations of representations…
First of all, phenomenology says that
consciousness is always consciousness of
something. The preposition ‘of’ is fundamental, because consciousness is
nothing in itself. In a sense, it only crystallizes because it bounces back on
itself. For every desiring there is a desired – consciousness is a desiring, it
is a mode of consciousness, it is the
way that consciousness is in the world at that moment. What is
fundamental to consciousness is that it is like an explosive upsurge into the
world. It is out amongst the things; it is not imprisoned in a box.
The idea of giving consciousness the designation
‘substance’ (res cogitans)
is highly problematic. It is a metaphysical leap. One does not need to do this.
In order to understand something about the functioning of consciousness, one
does not have to take up such a metaphysical position. Likewise, as far as the
actuality status of things in the world is concerned – we don’t have to take up
a position on that.
Basically, if we are to speak of ‘evidence’, we do
not have recourse to any other evidence outside of experience. All we have
recourse to is that which is given through experience itself. Experience is
evidence. Which means that: if we see something – and we know the difference
between an object as it stands there before us (as it gives itself to us) and,
let’s say, an object of imagination, or something that I am merely
anticipating, or something that I am remembering, or a pictorial image that I
am thinking about in order to reproduce it on the canvas, – we know that these forms
of presence have entirely different signatures, and we know how to distinguish
between them. I know the difference between closing my eyes and seeing an image
of this table and actually looking at the table. If I walk out there and don’t
look at anything, but actually just remember the image – again, I know that I
am remembering something. There is
something about experience itself that signifies that which is given to it in a
certain way – in a certain light – that lets us know the difference between
that which is actual and that which is not.
I know that the ‘good old objective scientists’ would not be happy with
this, but in a way his / her concerns are not those of the phenomenologists. In
a way, what the traditional (pre-Heisenberg) scientists are trying to do is
this: we have the objective ground there, and then we have the subjective one –
two spheres – and they are always kind of interacting in some way, but we don’t
quite know how. If we want to focus purely on the objective realm, we find that
we are faced with a considerable problem. Heisenberg showed that very
effectively. Whenever we observe and try to measure, we are actually
interfering with the phenomena being measured. So, we cannot avoid the
subjective element involved in the measurement itself in the objective
observation. So, the meaning of objectivity in the sciences has softened – it
is now the question of inter-subjectivity, the ‘consensus’ between individual
subjectivities. It is no longer outside
subjectivity.
Husserl comes along and says – OK, so what is already implied if we
start out from the traditional Cartesian dyad of subjectivity and objectivity –
res cogitans
and res extensa?
Somehow, there is some kind of interrelation. But, when we talk about evidence,
experience, observation, etc., we are actually within the fold of the encounter between these two spheres. We
cannot account for how they interact cosmologically (causally), but we are
already operating within the fold of their intertwining. So – take that as a
given, because … where else are we going to start? We are there already! OK, so
what do we do now? Since we are already functioning within the sphere of
experience – please hold on to the image of an overlapping of the two spheres,
and then just get rid of the spheres. Then, all we have is ‘relation’, without
independent entities being in relation. We can allow some sort of
re-construction from within this ‘field’ or ‘horizon.’
It is not so hard to actually visualize this shift, because it is also
very apparent in current objective / cosmological theories. It is a perfect
illustration of the difference between Newtonian physics and relativistic
physics. In Newtonian physics you have forces of attraction between independent
bodies. In Einsteinian relativistic physics you do
not. It is actually about the warpage of the
space-time fabric itself – where mass is a form of its curvature. It is
actually what is in-between that
counts.
Imagine a vast rubber sheet
stretched out, and then we drop balls of various weights onto it. Obviously,
the heavier they are, the deeper the wells that are created. If you drop a
small, lightweight ball onto the sheet, it naturally rolls to the deepest well
because of the warpage of the fabric itself. This is
a three-dimensional model to describe a four-dimensional space-time. But, here
we are talking about the ‘in-between’ that constitutes objects as part of a
fabric – not relations that occur between originally independent objects. What
is important here is the fabric in which objects are always already interwoven.
Interestingly enough, the Buddhists have such a conception of interdependent
origination that predates the Western orientation by a couple of thousand
years.
So, basically, since we are talking about experience, experience is, in
a sense, the meeting point of subjectivity and objectivity. Get rid of these
two independent spheres of substance, and just look at the relation itself,
because that is the realm in which we are always already operating. It is no
longer a question of causality, but that of intentionality.
This is where we find ourselves after the first phenomenological
reduction – epoché.
Basically, it is not to do away with the world – it is to engage with the world
qua phenomenon, as Husserl says,
where the actuality status of things is not given to us through some
independent criterion, but is given within the nexus of experience itself. And,
everything still exists, but with a different signature – i.e., as ‘actuality
phenomena.’ That means that something is given as an actuality, and what we
have to do is describe the structure of the experience that tells us this.
Thus, ‘actuality’ is no longer a simple ‘given.’ It requires descriptive
adumbration, which actually fleshes it out.
There are various other reductions that are implemented afterwards, and
it all gets more complicated. It is not necessary to go into that. If you
understand the basic movement, that’s good.
Now, in a sense, what you have done
is – you have placed the classical world of objectivity and the classical world
of subjectivity between brackets and, in a sense, you have crossed them out.
But – and this is a Derridian strategy now, because
he adds a cross to that which has been placed between parentheses – we still use the language of subjectivity and
objectivity. However, because of the crossing-out, which only partly obscures
them, we are warned; we are reminded that we have to take up an ironic attitude
with respect to our use of those expressions. This is known as ‘writing under
erasure’, and we come across this an awful lot in Derrida’s writings. It is
extremely important as well as being very interesting. It basically means that
you have not stepped outside the system – you are beginning to express the
exteriority of interiority and vice versa.
In a sense, we still use Cartesian
language, but we are not using it as Descartes used it, and we are not using it
as the tradition since Descartes has used it. We are having fun with it, but we
are playing by the same rules.
The difference between Descartes’
procedure of systematic ‘doubt’ and Husserl’s procedure of ‘suspension’ –
otherwise known as the epoché
– is as follows: Descartes doubts, therefore he sets himself up with a
diametrically opposing thesis to that which occupied his starting point. This
is to say that he still takes up a position – he still has an agenda, or a telos, if you like. Husserl’s epoché is different. Epoché means to
abstain from taking up a position at all. It means to be utopic. Of course
there are many problems that are inherent to such a methodology, which requires
constant self-critique. These are the reasons why Husserl calls phenomenology
‘a perpetual return to beginnings.’ There is always another way of
appropriating the matter or the text; there is always another way of returning
to it. It is a spiral movement. So, in a sense, Husserl is also always writing
under erasure.
What I have just described to you is Husserlian
phenomenology from a singularly contemporary deconstructive perspective. This
is not always made thematic in Husserl’s phenomenology. However, these dynamics
are at work. What is really interesting about Derrida’s deconstruction is that
he crystallizes them, makes them thematic, and puts them to work as fundamental
moments of his strategy.
Robbie: How
can you get out of the madness – by illusory distinctions between actuality and
possibility?
Louis: Husserl said that the
‘knowledge of possibilities’ precedes the ‘knowledge of actualities’. In a
certain sense, the issue of possibility has a more crucial role to play.
This is basically about openness. Husserl’s philosophy is all about
restoring one’s sense of wonder in the face of the familiar. The familiar is
familiar, precisely because we don’t see it any more – we are so used to it. To
restore wonder in the face of the mundane means to actually see it again.
If you are working within the limitations of society’s normative values,
then obviously you are not going to speak of insanity, if you uphold those
values. However, how are we to understand something like nazi
Germany? The normative values that emerged and were maintained within that
milieu were such that you could do incredibly psychotic things and be praised
for it.
By the way, Josef has brought along this really amazing quotation concerning
the ways in which our most important values can be distorted and undermined. I
want him to read it, and then Anna will present a charming limerick that plays
on the semantical confusion that can arise from
homophony (different words that sound alike).
I am trying to bring all these apparently disparate threads together
here, and it is a very difficult task. What I am saying is that this is all
about openness to alterity – to the Other – an
openness to possibilities. There is a possibility of restoring sanity, not
according to consensus (which is about the application and maintenance of
normative values, which can in themselves invoke you to do insane things), but
by being open to the other – as Nietzsche says, ‘with ears behind one’s ears.’
So, really it all depends on the definition of insanity here. I would say that
with the Cartesian procedure you do arrive at insanity. Solipsistic delusion is
one of the defining characteristics of psychosis.
Robbie: There
is no problem with mathematics or astronomy…. Philosophy is mad!
Louis: I need to cite Foucault
here. Sanity and insanity are inventions. This is basically about power and
political marginalization. The concept of insanity is born in language – and
language defines the world. The definition of madness is not stable, it changes
over time. Principally, it is a language of exclusion (regardless of the
time-frame), which cannot take the language of the Other into account – which
is where Derrida’s deconstruction comes in by playing with the possibility of
dialogue. I am not sure that one can go deeper than that when making grand
statements like “Philosophy is mad!” Which philosophy, which language? Unless,
of course one dives straight into a pre-linguistic and transcendentally
psychotic attitude, as Descartes does when he reaches the point of solipsism in
his meditations. So, which one do you want? Take your pick.
One definition of sanity may be
approached through the question about what constitutes philosophical
responsibility. For all I know, I may be one of the very few deconstructionists
who actually appreciates this about Derrida’s deconstruction. I see something
highly ethical about what Derrida is doing, and I see a great deal of
philosophical responsibility in what comes out of his writing. However, it is
not something that one can see immediately. I think that this comes out of his
invitation to us to take on responsibility ourselves. “Above all,” he says,
“one must “re-read those in whose wake I write” – which is to say, don’t just
take my word for it.
Josef, I want you to read that amazing little discourse on the fluidity
of the definition of virtue that you found and sent to me by E-mail. It is a
disturbing account of how definitions can change their meaningful resonances…
Anna: I
was just reminded of your phrase, “to do
phenomenology is to be a little mad.”
* * *
Louis: By
the way, if you all want to understand a little bit more about the history of
the movement from phenomenology to deconstruction (which is by no means a
movement of surpassing), I have made a photocopy of my first published article
from 1989 called “Différance
Beyond Phenomenological Reduction (Epoché)?” – [it is a question]. It is available in the same
box as the other essays in the office, and you are welcome to make photocopies
of it. I think that it is quite a good propadeutic to
understanding what is really going on, so it may help you out a little. And,
now for Josef’s presentation…
Josef: This is something that I did not
find in yesterday’s newspaper…
And so many terrible things happened
to cities through civil conflict, things which happen and always will happen so
long as the nature of men is the same, but which are worse or milder and differ
in their forms according to the variations of the circumstances in each case.
In periods of peace and prosperity both states and individuals maintain better
dispositions, because they do not fall under necessities against their will.
But war, which robs people of the easy supply of their daily wants, is a
violent schoolmaster matching most men’s tempers to their conditions.
There was, then, civil conflict; and those of the
cities which were involved later, through hearing of what had happened earlier,
pushed on to further extremes of innovation both in the ingenuity of their
schemes for seizing power and in the extravagance of their reprisals. They
altered the accepted usage of words in relation to deeds as they thought fit.
Reckless audacity was termed courageous loyalty to party; prudent hesitation,
specious cowardice; moderation, a cover for spinelessness; and ability to
understand all sides, total inertia. Fanatical enthusiasm was rated a man’s
part; and cautious deliberation, a euphemism for desertion. The advocate of
extreme measures was always trustworthy; his opponent a man to be suspected.
The fair proposals of an adversary were met with
jealous precautions by the other and not with generous confidence. Revenge also
was held of more account than self-preservation. Oaths of reconciliation, being
only proffered by either side to meet an immediate difficulty, only held good
so long as no other weapon was at hand; but when opportunity offered, he who
first ventured to seize it and to take his enemy off his guard, thought this
perfidious vengeance sweeter than an open one……
Thucidides – The Peloponnesian War
– Book III, Chapter IX, 82, The Corcyraean
Revolution
This was written 2400 years ago.
Louis: Brilliant and scary! If
any of you come across little texts like this – a few paragraphs or a few
aphorisms – please, copy them down and send them to me, and I can relay them to
all of you. Then, we can begin to play ourselves…
Yaki mentioned something about Oscar
Wilde a little while ago that I’d love to have a look at. Perhaps he’ll be kind
enough to bring this along. I have some short essays by Umberto Eco (from Misreadings) and
Jorge Luis Borges (Labyrinths) that
you may find illuminating.
Deconstruction,
in a sense, is not new. Derrida’s genius happens to lie in the way, in which he
thematized it, gave it a set of rules and played
around with it. In a way, he also follows a long tradition. So, it would be
interesting to uncover things like this in other texts that may be familiar,
and even other texts that don’t seem outwardly deconstructive, which we
ourselves could deconstruct or to which we may apply an entirely different
narrative form. We should understand something about the methods of
deconstruction, the strategies and techniques involved. But, what would be
really fun is for us to actually do
some deconstruction. So, when we have some understanding of the basic rules –
then we can start to play.
‘Play’ is
one of the primary motifs in deconstruction. ‘Play’ does not equal
irresponsibility. Think of the way children play. They have very firm ideas
about rules. Look at the rigour, with which children
play. That’s the philosophical approach.
Now I’d
like to read something that Anna sent to me, and it is great fun. Remember,
what I said earlier on about Derrida overturning what he claimed to be the
fundamental thread of Western philosophy – phonocentrism.
He introduces the neologism of différance with an ‘a’ – whose sense of distinctness from
difference with an ‘e’ cannot be discerned phonetically, but only graphically.
In what follows, we have a nice little analogue of how this is put to work and
the kind of confusion that can occur at the phonetic level…
A tutor who tooted the flute
Tried to teach two young tooters to toot.
Said the two to the tutor,
”Is it harder to toot, or
To tutor two tooters to toot?”
Carolyn Wells (1862-1942)
There is
also a great deal of humour in what Derrida is doing,
but it is not ‘immediately’ apparent. He is another kind of philosophers’
philosopher. Therefore, to really appreciate what he is doing, you need to
understand something of the history and the context, in which he is writing,
and about what he is writing. And, it is difficult for us mere mortals to do
that – but it is not impossible. I’ve heard of Derrida being referred to as
‘the Aristotle of the twentieth century’ (however, I’m not sure I agree with
such an epithet).
We do
need to know something about the tradition of deconstruction, so we’ll need to
take a route through phenomenology. And, I’ll try to point out the humour, as I see it, as we go through Derrida’s essays.
* * *
I want as
many of you as possible to get hold of a funny book that Josef has brought
along, called Derrida for Beginners. It
was put together by two gentlemen who share a brilliant sense of humour, and it is kind of like a comic book. If one looks
through it – it is actually quite informative. It does not make any fundamental
mistakes and it provides some useful definitions. I would say that its
conceptual format is almost genius, actually. I wish that I had had something
like it, when I started studying deconstruction.
So, next
week I would really like us to go through Derrida’s essay “Différance”
itself. Once you’ve actually got copies – underline parts that are particularly
interesting, whether you think that you understand them or not, or make a note
of something that reminds you of another text, etc. I want us to spend couple
of weeks on this essay, because it is a very important introduction to
deconstructive strategy – and we will probably return to it again and again.
Then I
will give you a list of essays by Derrida that I think would be interesting,
and we can all take a vote on which ones to look at – and in what order –
whether you are particularly interested in Derrida’s attitude to Husserl,
Heidegger, Freud, Saussure, Foucault or James Joyce…. I don’t want to be
lecturing every week. I am just trying to give you an introduction here. I
would like everyone to get involved. Don’t be put off by the assumption that
your lack of familiarity with deconstruction means that you do not have
anything to contribute. Deconstruction is such that there are no true experts.
The whole issue of ‘mastery’ is always open to deconstruction.
* * *
I
recently read a short article, which I recommend that you read (it’s with the
other texts that I’ve mentioned). It is an interview with David Wood, the
original supervisor of my Ph.D. studies at Warwick University (he is now a
professor at Vanderbilt University in America). When asked about whether
deconstruction has been superseded, he basically shows that this is an absurd
question. It is not a system to be superseded. And, there certainly isn’t any
great new telos to replace the teleological absence
about which deconstruction speaks. It is about critical reasoning. It is a
tool, and I like to think of it as being fundamentally Socratic / maieutic. It
is like a midwife of meaning, a facilitator of alternatives, possibilities, alterity… If you are well versed in deconstructive writing,
this definitely gives you an edge in argumentation. [To Mor:]
As a lawyer, this would be a very useful tool for you.
Mor: Yes, but then it
is treated only as a rhetorical tool and nothing more – there is nothing behind
it.
Louis: Isn’t this how most lawyers, or at least the
successful ones, operate?
Deconstruction
is not just simply for philosophers. I am trying to show its philosophical
aspects by talking about the history out of which it has emerged – and into
which it constantly re-immerses itself – but I also want to open a space of
discourse that is broader than that of academic philosophy or pedagogy…
Mor: Lawyers would
abuse it.
Josef: Lawyers know it by instinct. They
don’t have to learn. A good lawyer deconstructs his opponent’s position totally
and constructs in its place something completely different.
Robbie: That is the whole point.
Louis: In a way, yes. You can scream: “Derrida, what
have you done? You have given all these awful people these powerful tools!” I
guess that you can say the same about the common misappropriations of Nietzsche
and the way in which his name became associated with the nazis.
It does
raise a very difficult question – philosophical responsibility. I’ve already
given you my own personal view about the sense of responsibility with which I
am always left when I read Derrida. It is like – I am responsible; what am I
going to do with it? So, he has restored that power to us. The point is that it
is very easy to misappropriate Derrida. In the same way, it is very easy to
misappropriate Nietzsche [as an aside… especially when he writes about
‘imagining truth to be a woman’].
* * *
Yes, it
is a difficult question. I remember having a chat with David Wood about the
issue of responsibility in relation to writing an essay about the positive
aspects of suicide. Suppose that a number of people responded to such an essay
by saying: “Don’t you realize that people have committed suicide as a result of
reading your paper? Don’t you have any sense of responsibility?”
Robbie: Then you can say that you were just
repeating what Shopenhauer said before.
Louis: Okay. But, the point is, as a philosopher,
let’s say that I write a piece on the merits of suicide – and then I start to
receive letters from people saying things like: “Don’t you realize that my son
committed suicide as a result of reading your paper? Have you no sense of
philosophical responsibility, no morality?” This raises some difficult questions,
not least of which involve matters of law. In a sense, it is illegal to commit
suicide – or, rather, an attempted suicide is put down to unsound mind and judgement and one can be commited
for it.
But then
– on the other hand – it may well be that out of the few that did commit
suicide from reading my paper, it saved the lives of many others. It’s
possible, but I would probably never know – and perhaps, due to certain
subliminal aspects of reading, neither would they.
The
reason that I mention this is because of the way in which Nietzsche spoke about
the power of melancholy and suicide. First of all, he said that the melancholic
truly knows how to grasp happiness. It is interesting – think about that for a
moment. With respect to the issue of suicide, in particular, there is a very
important sense in which contemplation on such an absolute act can restore our
possibilities back to us. This brings us to the great Shakespearean question
‘to be, or not to be.’
Basically,
when one feels that one is nothing more than a reed bending in the wind,
bending to breaking point – where it seems that one has no control over one’s
destiny; where there is no real freedom or a meaningful frame to existence –
deliverance becomes possible. Basically, Nietzsche is saying that when you
reach the point of contemplating suicide, you realize, ultimately, that the
final event, that final act is yours to make. It is your responsibility. In a
sense, you find that your footing has been restored to an absolutely base
position. It is very fundamental. You find that the ‘ultimate choice’ is yours.
From that you can rebuild your life. This is the greatest value of Nietzsche’s
discourse on suicide.
So, let
us suppose that I basically said the same thing in my hypothetical essay.
Perhaps some people might find themselves so deeply inspired by it that if I
hadn’t written it, they would have actually committed suicide. Unfortunately,
there are others who might read it and consequently they might interpret it as
some kind of encouragement to commit suicide. That would be a reasonable
answer. I suppose that success or failure would depend a great deal on the
narrative style of delivery – but not exclusively, since the manner of its
appropriation by the reader is always beyond the writer’s ability to control.
We have to be careful when talking about the issue of how a text may inspire
people. Implicitly, we use the language of causation – and this is highly
problematic.
Sergei: This raises some important moral questions.
Deconstruction appears to potentially undermine discourse on ethics. In a way,
nothing is sacred.
Louis: This
would certainly be the case with any deontological system of ethics. This is a
truly horrible area, I tell you. I wonder what kind of relevance a prescriptive
system has in our time of postmodern pluralism – because there do not seem to
be any regulative principles that work across
cultures. Utilitarianism does work across cultures, to a certain extent,
because it is about ends defined by contexts, and it is not necessarily about
conduct. So, for instance, within a utilitarian framework we should not really
have missionarism or colonialism (although history
tells us otherwise). But, deontology is a little bit scary. It’s about everyone
being told how to act. Prescriptive
ethics is highly problematic. There is something mildly revolting about only
acting out of some sense of duty in accordance with a specified rule of
conduct.
Robbie: This whole world scares me, actually.
It is the age of nihilism.
Louis: Jacques
Derrida seems to be very much a part of this pool. But, he has fun with it.
Sergei: I would like to ask you some
questions concerning semiotics. One of them is in relation to Saussure, which Derrida
does discuss, and the other one is that of Aristotle, which he discusses, but
not in an affirmative way. What is the problem of difference to Aristotelian
semiotics? According to Aristotle, the concepts are not the differences, but
the mutuals. How do I learn what the ‘glass’ means?
It is not that I learn that ‘glass is not green’, or ‘glass is not silver’ –
no, I learn: this is glass, and this one is not. What I learn is the mutual
traits that the objects have, and those traits classify them in the same
category, like ‘glasses’.
Louis: Ah
yes, the good old language of universals and particulars or types and tokens.
Sergei: Yes, exactly. And, in this system
the question of difference is not so abstract
– although there are major problems with Aristotle, if we don’t
understand the concepts or mistake certain differences. There is no difference
inside the sign; there is only the mutual. ‘Glass’ doesn’t point out that it is
‘not green’, the only point of it is that it is ‘glass’. It doesn’t say anything
about its colour, about its size, etc. – there is no
differentiation. What Saussure does is he says that signs are not actually
about mutuals, they are about differences, which is
something that I can hardly understand. I can understand what he means, but
then it is hard to have any sense of objects.
* * *
Louis: When you identify something, you certainly
don’t operate in this way. Let’s face it, if you were to identify something
purely in terms of what it is not, you would have to take the whole universe
into account with each particular classification. We don’t do this. It would be
highly uneconomical.
However,
to say that we don’t perceive or think that way isn’t to say that it is not
already operative to some extent in consciousness and language. The point is
that this is not something that we do,
and this is not something at the deepest levels of cognition that is actually
at work. At the level of the play of signification – of signifiers that Derrida
is talking about – there is no room for consciousness. It is pre-conscious,
pre-consciousness. And, also – we are not talking about relations between
particular differences here, because what you [Sergei] describe is still a
question of semiotics, e.g., ‘the glass is or is not green.’ ‘Glass’ and
‘green’ have certain kinds of meaning and ‘is’ and ‘is-not’ give predicative
relations. We are not talking about differences between different meanings. We
are talking about ‘differences’ between differences. It is an a-semic determination. It is difference – without being
reducible to opposition – through which parameters come to be formed and
meaning can be crystallized.
It is
very hard to grasp this, because we don’t actually think in this way either –
that is, in our day-to-day habituated performances. I am speaking about the
primary way in which signifiers work, according to Saussure. And, this is also
something that Derrida plays with. But, if you confine yourself to a merely
static phenomenology or Saussurean static
linguistics, neither of which really take genetic structuration (time and
sedimentation) into account, then you will have a real problem grasping it. In
a way, this would be kind of pre-phenomenological. Actually, it is
pre-phenomenological-epoché
– pre-phenomenology in the sense that it precedes all the reductions that
Husserl initiated. Husserl never went that far in specific reference to the
theme of the sign. However, he traced out another path that went as far, and
considerably further, in his 1905–1910 lectures on the phenomenology of the temporalization of consciousness. However, they preceded
any publication on the manifold forms of the method of epoché.
In the
first volume of the text, Ideas
Pertaining to a Pure Phenomenology and to a Phenomenological Philosophy, published
in 1913, Husserl spoke of the reduction or epoché in the following terms: he
said that the method itself has no natural limits. Basically, it is put to use
for a specific purpose (I wish I had the quote – it is fascinating!). He says
that there is arbitrariness involved in the way in which we implement the
reduction – we bracket out this or that. If we took it to its absolute limits,
we could bracket out everything. But, then, there would be nothing left over to
discuss. What he meant by that is that there would be no meaning left. You have
structure and structuralization in abundance, but
there is no meaning.
The only
time that this actually occurs is in his Phenomenology
of Internal Time Consciousness, which – as I said – funnily enough, comes
before he actually thematized the epoché. But, here he talks about
arriving at Primordial Flux. This is the flux, through which Time itself can
unfold. And, he says of this flux that it has structurality
in abundance, but it is ‘a region for which names
are lacking’ – names as signifiers of meaning.
What we
are talking about are pure structures of repetition. Derrida’s interest here is
quite clear. What he likes to talk about are the different kinds of dynamics
that are at work in signification – dynamics that always already presuppose
repeatability. Again – this is brought out by différance. This neologism has a
constellation of different meanings. For instance, it is a combination of both
spatial determinations and temporal determinations. The Latin word, ‘differre’ combines both ‘difference,’ of a spatial order
and ‘deferral,’ which is a temporal designation – ‘deferral,’ as in ‘to
postpone,’ ‘to put off until later.’ There is also a ‘detour,’ a ‘relay’ – all
these kinds of dynamics are operative in the play of signification. And, it is
precisely because of these dynamics that meaning can unfold. So, in a sense,
this is beneath meaning. Meaning is like an emergent function of these traces.
These traces are, in a sense, original traces – they are not traces ‘of’ more
original meanings. They always already precede meaning as the condition of its
possibility.
Sergei: For me, it is easier to understand
those traces as parts of Aristotelian concepts.
Louis: But here, this is all turned on its head. This is
what really screws with our heads. And, rigorous deconstruction asks you to
deal with it that way, and it is very hard, I know.
Sergei: I don’t know. I think that Saussure
is speaking about ‘natural differences’. And actually, whatever Derrida does, he
does not add that much to the Saussurean idea.
Louis: I agree…up to a point. There is much that is structuralist in orientation about what Derrida is doing.
However,
the real difference that signifies a departure from Saussure, is that he has
travelled a number of different phenomenological pathways. Derrida has a more
sophisticated appreciation of the role of the temporality of signification and
the intertwining of space and time.
In Saussurean linguistics, there is a distinction between ‘Lange’ and ‘Parole’. ‘Lange’, in a sense, is that meta-structural domain of
synchronicity, a framework of differences between differences and not just
differences between positive terms. It is timeless. It is a nexus of
diacritical differences, whereas ‘Parole’ is meaning as it unfolds
diachronically. Synchrony contra diachrony. Temporality is cast out to the
external skin of language – time as diachrony / successivity, according to the classic distinction between space
(as the order of co-existences) and time (as the order of successions). This is repeated in
Saussure. Parole emerges out of a kind of subsoil of synchronous diacritical
differences. This dimension of pure synchronous structurality
is coextensive, whereas meaning / parole only emerges diachronically – in time.
This is
highly problematic. Derrida, following Husserl, would be entitled to say: even
that which we take as a realm of synchrony is a certain kind of time. The
German word is Überzeitlich
– it is like a ‘super-time’ or an ‘over-time.’ There are many different kinds
of temporality. If one is not restricted to linear cosmological time, in which it is understood as a purely successive
sequence, one may grasp, phenomenologically, that
time can fold in on itself. All time can be coextensive without nullifying the
temporal differences that are interwoven into its flattened out fabric. It can
run backwards, different temporal moments can be shuffled around, or one’s life
can flash before one’s eyes in a fraction of a second.
Also, if
one understands something about the functioning of association in language,
there is something holographic about it. The structurality
of meaning as articulated in language is irreducible to a linear matrix of
associations. The ‘saying’ follows a linear, successive sequence, but this is
not necessarily true of the ‘said.’ Think of the word ‘intuition’ – it is like
a timeless articulation of many different meanings at once, a Gestalt kind of
knowledge: “Ah! Eureka!” “It all fits!” Many different ideas may emerge
simultaneously. It was necessary to develop these ideas at different times, but
they can stand out together in an economy of co-presence.
Consider
what happens when you break a hologram. Firstly, if you tear up a photograph
and throw it on the floor – you will be left with incomplete, disconnected
fragments of the original image in all the pieces. However, If you look into
the shards of a broken hologram, each shard will contain the image as a whole.
This is a useful way of understanding how language operates. This is not to say
that it is timeless, but it is Überzeitlich (supra-temporal)– it
involves a kind of Super-Time.
If one
gets away from the reductive cosmological approach to time, which generally
defines it as a linear, successive sequence, one can understand that there are
many different kinds of temporalities at work in language, which can appear
synchronously – simultaneously. This is not a temporality / non-temporality.
Derrida has this advantage over Saussure, but it is one that is not immediately
apparent, unless you understand something about the history of discourse on
non-linear, pluri-dimensional time in the twentieth
century. With the help of Husserl, Heidegger, Freud, and even Einstein, not
excluding the existentialists, surrealists, quantum theorists, and
deconstructionists, twentieth century occidental philosophy was an interesting
epoch for discourse on time.
Sergei: Then I have another question.
Something reminded me of the strategy of sous rature
(the French expression for ‘writing under erasure’). Saussure says that a sign
does not, in a sense, make itself present. What we have may be an acoustical
phenomenological or visual phenomenological presentation. Is this the case in
phenomenology or are you saying that what we see is a sign – the phenomenon of
simply a sign as a sign, nothing else?
Louis: Phenomenology
shares in a similar horizon to Saussurean
structuralism…which affirms your first comment about what actually appears –
not the sign as some objective replacement for something other than itself, but
precisely that which gives itself through
the sign.
Okay.
What I want to do here is relate the idea of signification to the way in which
Husserl speaks about intentionality, because I know that you will appreciate
the analogue.
First of all,
consciousness is consciousness of
something. Its relation to itself is, in a sense, mediated through that towards
which it is directed – even if it is directed toward nothing in particular
(which is often the case). So, in this sense, it only folds back on itself
after originally transgressing itself. This is very much a Sartrean
determination of intentionality, but it is at work in Husserl as well. Both
Husserl and Sartre would say that a pre-reflexive consciousness is just simply
involved in its objects, and it is not so much aware of itself. This original
self-transcendency is the same with a sign. A sign is
originally transparent. It always recedes before that towards which it is
directed – to the meaning that gives itself through
the sign. The moment that the sign becomes opaque, it is in the absence of
meaning. Without getting too bound up in what is tantamount to being a
theological consideration, this substitution of the sign for that toward which
it is directed is an essential component of what it is to be a symbol, and this
is something quite different. Again – it is a sign, but it is a proxy, it
stands in the place of something else.
A sign
stands out in the absence of meaning. If it is doing its job, it actually
erases itself in its directedness toward something Other.
Sergei: Saussure says that what we hear is
not a sign, but an acoustical phenomenon.
Louis: Yes, because a sign does not primarily stand in
as a ‘substitute’ for something that is signified. A sign only stands out as an object in the absence of the
signified. What is signified is an “acoustical phenomenon." I have a
feeling that we shall be returning to the phenomenological aspects of Saussurean linguistics again and again.
* * *