Jacques Derrida
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Introduction to Jacques Derrida
by Roger Geertz Gonzalez

When discussing contemporary cultural theory such as structuralism, postructuralism, postmodernism, postcolonialism, feminist theory, and cultural studies, you will most likely encounter a common, foundational lexicon. This includes words such as "trace," "presence," "difference," "deconstruction," "logos," and "play." Their birth took place with the publication of Jacques Derrida's Of Grammatology.

In Of Grammatology, Derrida analyzes and criticizes Western Philosophy beginning with the pre-Socratics to Heidegger and beyond. His fundamental criticism of Western Philosophy is that it privileges or favors "logos," or speech. According to him, logos claim and pretend to exhibit a direct form of language and therefore, a tight closeness to a specific "presence" or center of identity/subjectivity. Western Philosophy while praising logos, debases "writing." Ironically, these philosophers try to imprint writing with logos patterns. Thus, writing or "texts" claims and pretends to exhibit a presence of identity/subjectivity, a presence of authority, and a presence of power.

To debunk this idea, Derrida develops a method to identify these patterns. He calls it "deconstruction." What deconstruction does is to identify logocentric paradigms, such as dichotomies, and show that the possibility of presence within any contextual language is in constant "play" and "differs" continously in relation to something else, and because of this, only a "trace" of the subject/object exists.

Some critics claim that deconstruction as an analytical method is either slowly fading or already dead. What these critics tend to ignore is that new paradigms must build on the old ones for guidance and growth in the world of theory.

GENERAL SOURCES