without grounds for believing it to be true, Descartes began with the one thing h e

could know—that consciousness of his thinking proved his own existence . "Cogito,
ergo sum," he declared . "I think, therefore I am ." From that one certainty, all othe r
8 knowledge could proceed . The Cartesian approach, which elevated the importanc e
of reason over passion, superstition, and imagination as a means of finding truth
in the natural world, has had an impact well beyond the seventeenth century . It has
DECONSTRUCTIO N helped shape the thinking of humanists, artists, and philosophers into the twenty-firs t
century, providing them with the conviction that they could make a better world . If
meaning and truth could be found by thinking and acting rationally, humankind coul d
solve social problems, cure illnesses, and create new technologies . In short, throug h
the use of reason, progress was possible, perhaps inevitable.
The confidence inspired by such a worldview came into question toward the en d
of the nineteenth century, when a radical revisioning of "reality" took place in a wid e
Deconstruction's admirers see it as a way that begins to le t variety of disciplines . The long-held view of the world as a knowable, objective entit y
us question the presuppositions of the language we think in . that could be discovered through direct experience of the senses encountered seriou s
Its detractors condemn its subtle and convoluted readings a s challenges in fields as diverse as physics, linguistics, anthropology, and psychol-
narcissistic self-reflexivity. ogy . In philosophy, for example, thinkers such as Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900 )
SHIRLEY F. STATO N began to question the existence of objective truth . Nietzsche even announced th e
death of God, by which he meant that human beings were no longer able to sus-
tain belief . Without God, however, he worried that there would be no cosmic order
The term deconstruction sends many readers running for cover, partly because it i or universal moral law that bound all human beings . Such a state of being carrie d
s
one of the most radical approaches to reading that has appeared on the scene, bu t with it the threat that humankind could fall into nihilism and perhaps lawlessness .
also because its terminology presents difficulties of its own . Why, then, does anyon e Consequently, Nietzsche called for a reevaluation of basic beliefs that would make i t
want to understand it or use it to read a poem or story? Perhaps the best answer is tha t possible for human beings to develop their creative powers in this world, not the next .
deconstruction provides a way of playing with language and meaning that teases and In place of the limitations imposed by religion's commands and laws and instead o f
delights . It is not a fully developed critical method or school or even a philosophy . the despair caused by lack of faith, he believed humankind could exercise newl y
Instead, it is, says its founder Jacques Derrida, a strategy, some "rules for reading , found freedoms that would liberate the human spirit . He foresaw a "superman" (the
interpretation, and writing . " Übermensch) who would be strong and independent, freed from all values excep t
those he deemed to be valid .
Using different terminology, spokespersons from other areas of study echoe d
HISTORICAL BACKGROUN D Nietzsche's denial of an ultimate reality that is static, unified, and absolute, t o
be replaced by an understanding of the world as relativistic, dynamic, and open .
Deconstruction is the best-known (and most significant) of a kind of literary criticis m In 1905, for example, Albert Einstein (1879–1955) published a paper that would
known as poststructuralism ; in fact, many people use the terms interchangeably . change scientists' understanding of time, space, and reality . His ideas about th e
To understand the revolution that poststructuralism has created in literary criticism , velocity of light challenged the assumption that there is such a thing as time tha t
it is necessary to look at some of its predecessors, both structuralism—the move - all clocks measure . In other words, the concept of absolute time was replaced wit h
ment that it both incorporates and undermines—and those that structuralism itsel f time as being relative to motion . Such thinking represented a fundamental shift i n
challenged . the way we see ourselves and our world . It would later lead to questions about th e
The revolutionary nature of deconstruction can be summarized by saying that , nature of human behavior, belief, and morality . "Is everything relative? " the twen-
in general, it challenges the way Western civilization has conceived of the worl d tieth century would ask .
since Plato . More specifically, it overturns the principles that have provided basi c The study of language was not immune to such probing . For two hundred
beliefs about truth and meaning since the seventeenth-century French philosopher , years, language had been viewed as a transparent medium through which realit y
scientist, and mathematician René Descartes (1596–1650) applied the rational , could be set down accurately and shaped into an aesthetic form . Finding meaning,
inductive methods of science to philosophy . Refusing to accept the truth of anything which was assumed to be present, required finding the words that corresponded to the

150
 objects and experiences observed . Literature was taken to be mimetic, reflectin g them in particular but also to discover underlying similarities between that societ y
presenting truths about life and the human condition . Because texts depicted life i and the society of others .
n
powerful way, they were thought to have a life of their own that could be discove r Because behaviors that on the surface appear to be vastly different from eac h
and analyzed . Enter the critic, whose job was to reveal the value and meaning of other may have commonalities beneath the surface that link the human beings wh o
t
For example, the formalists (the New Critics, as distinguished from the Russianexts; for to sup -
practi c e them, observations of concrete local phenomena allow the researcher
malists), who carried the nineteenth-century empirical worldview into the twentiet - port assumptions about human society that cross cultural boundaries . Claude Lévi-
h t
century, saw a poem as a self-sufficient object possessing unity and form and o peratin , for example, often found the mythologies of various cultures to be differen
g Straus s d
within its own rules to resolve ambiguities, ironies, and paradoxes (see Chapter 3) , . Their basic similarities of structure, which he calle
version s of the same narrative
Formalists sought to determine not what the poem means but how it means . There was .
mvthemes, he judged to be reflective of human concerns that are not culturally bound
no doubt that with the application of intellectual analysis, an understanding of for m In short, structuralists are looking not for structures in a physical sense but for pat -
would lead to meaning . Although an occasional doubter complained about the cold terns that underlie human behavior, experience, and creation .
,
unemotional nature of the formalists' close readings, there was no uncertainty abou A critical question has to do with the source of the structures themselves .
t
the presence of ultimate meaning . Traditionally, it has been assumed that the structures resided in the physical world .
The power of the formalists and their nineteenth-century heritage began to brea k Human beings found meaning in what they perceived outside themselves . However,
down in literary criticism with the appearance of the phenomenological critics, wh
o the structuralists argue from a different direction . According to them, structure come s
rejected the formalists' inability (or unwillingness) to question how readers know a from the human mind as it works to make sense of its world . Any given experience ,
literary work, as exemplified by their refusal to investigate the author's intentions . they say, is so full of information that it would be overwhelming if there were no wa y
The phenomenologists, who believe that meaning resides not in physical objects bu t of ordering it . The mind's defense is to sort and classify, make rules of process —
in human consciousness as the object is registered in it, emphasize the reader i n that is, to create a structure. It is such conceptual systems that make it possible fo r
making literature (see Chapter 7) . Instead of a single best reading of a text, the
y individuals to distinguish one type of object from another or to differentiate amon g
accept the possibility of many readings, because a text cannot exist separate fro m members of the same category . This fairly radical idea placed meaning in the mind o f
the individual mind that perceives it . It cannot be explained as something unto itself ; human beings rather than in external, objective reality. It is a short step from there t o
instead, it can be explained as an effect on a reader, and that effect will be differen t the idea that language, not sense experience or modes of consciousness, shapes wh o
for each reader because of the unique experiences each brings to the reading . In addi - we are, what we think, and what we understand reality to be .
tion, readers are called upon to supply missing material, to fill in textual gaps . They When the structuralist approach was applied to language, it caused a significan t
do so by using their own experiences with literature and life, thereby creating eve n departure from the traditional methods of study practiced by nineteenth-century phi-
more differences in interpretations . In other words, as in other fields, it is no longe
r lologists, who had examined language diachronically—tha t is, by tracing how word s
a given in literature that truth is static, absolute, and unified . Now it is deemed to b e evolved in meaning or sound over time . The philologists compared the changes the y
relative, dynamic, and open . found with those that had occurred in other languages and then looked for causes .
From the early part of the twentieth century came another set of ideas that wa s Their work assumed that language was mimetic—not a system with its own govern-
to have a significant impact on how people understand the world . Called structuralism, ing rules but one that reflected the world . A word, to them, was a symbol that wa s
it is, in its broadest sense, a science that seeks to understand how systems work . It equal to the object or concept it represented . In contrast, French linguist Ferdinand d e
accepts the belief that things cannot be understood individually . Instead, they have Saussure, who was responsible for the reappearance of structuralism in the twentiet h
to be seen as part of a larger structure to which they belong . Structuralists are no t century and who is generally regarded as the father of modern linguistics, began t o
so much interested in the operations (or aesthetics or meaning) of a single entity a s use a synchronic approach . This method involves looking at a language at one par-
they are in trying to describe the underlying (and not necessarily visible) principle s ticular time in search of the principles that govern its functions, principles of which
by which it exists . Assuming that individual characteristics that can be noted o n its users might not even be consciously aware . As explained in Course in Genera l
r
the surface are rooted in some general organization, structuralists collect observabl e Linguistics (1972), a work based on student notes that his colleagues produced afte
information about an item or practice in order to discover the laws that govern it . For his death, Saussure looked for the foundational system of language by observing it s
example, a structuralist studying urban American architecture of the twentieth cen- surface uses .
tury will be interested in the characteristics of a single building only insofar as they Saussure's studies led him to reject the idea that language is simply a tool to
provide data that help define the bigger category of architectural objects to which tha t be used to represent a preexistent reality. That is, he did not accept the idea that i t
building belongs . A structural anthropologist may examine the customs and rituals o f s
is mimetic or transparent . Instead, he argued that language is a system that has it
langue, and he referred to the
a single group of people in some remote part of the world not simply to understand own rules of operations . He called those general rules
 JJ

applications that members of a particular speech community make of those rules i n not necessarily one involving words . Any organized, structured set of signs carrie s
their iterations as parole . In other words, langue, sometimes referred to as a grammar , cultural meanings, making it possible to "read" a culture by examining those signs .
is the system within which individual verbalizations have meaning, and parole refer s Saussure, in fact, proposed the development of a science called semiology that woul d
to the individual verbalizations . The rules of langue, which the individual speake r investigate meaning through signs observable in cultural phenomena . Because lan-
absorbs as a member of a culture, are manifested in parole . In his efforts to identif y guage is the primary signifying system, it would be the chief focus of study, an d
and explain how all this works, Saussure swept away the nineteenth-century corre- research into other systems would follow the model used in studying it .
spondence model between words and things and gave us language that is connecte d At the same time, in the United States, Charles Sanders Pierce was developin g
only conventionally and arbitrarily to the world outside it . semiotics, which applied structuralist principles to the study of sign systems and th e
One of the concepts important to Saussure's explanation of the language syste m way meaning is derived from them . The point is the same as in semiology : to treat
is that of signs, which he describes as being composed of two parts : a written or all forms of social behavior as signifying systems that are defined by the structur e
sound construction, known as the signifier, and its meaning, called the signified. Th e of their interrelationships . The process provides anthropologists, sociologists, psy-
spoken or written form of hat, for example, is a signifier. The concept that flashes int o chologists, and others with a way to go beneath external facts to examine the natur e
your mind when you hear or read it is the signified . With the introduction of thes e of the human experience . Semiotics has proved to be valuable in studying phenomen a
terms, and the theory underlying them, Saussure transformed the sense of what a as disparate as Barbie dolls and the mythologies of little-known cultures .
word is . He made it no longer possible to speak of a word as a symbol that represent s Literary critics who subscribe to the tenets of structuralism work most ofte n
a thing outside of it, as it had conventionally been known . Because a signifier doe s with prose narratives . Usually they seek to connect a text with a larger structure, suc h
not refer to some object in the world but to a concept in the mind, it is language, an d as a genre or some universal narrative form . They often establish connections wit h
not the world external to us, that mediates our reality . We see only what languag e other texts that have similar patterns or motifs . On a broader scale, they sometime s
allows us to see both outside and inside ourselves . It does not simply record our worl d find parallels between a literary work and the structure of language itself . They are
or provide labels for what is in it . Instead, according to Saussure, language consti- also drawn to work derived from Sausssure's ideas concerning semiology or Pierce' s
tutes our world ; it structures our experience . Consider, for example, how speaker s semiotics, causing them to look at the whole of Western culture as a system of signs ,
of different languages tend to have differing views of the world . They see the worl d drawing inferences from artifacts that to others might seem trivial and insignificant .
through different structures. Such analyses sometimes lead critics to asking abstract questions more common t o
The connection between the signifier and the signified has several importan t philosophy and sociology than to literature ; doing so takes the critic away from th e
characteristics . First of all, it is not a natural relationship but an arbitrary one . Th e text, leaving structuralist criticism open to charges that it is not primarily a literar y
signifier hat has no inherent link with the physical object you wear on your head . It strategy.
could just as easily have been called a rose or a bed . Then how do a signifier and a Deconstruction, a product of the late 1960s, extended structuralist ideas abou t
signified become tied together? The relationship comes about through convention , the nature of the sign, the importance of difference and binary oppositions, and th e
an agreement on the part of speakers that the two are associated . Finally, we know role of language in mediating experience, sometimes in ways that contradicted struc-
one sign from another not because of meanings they inherently carry but because o f turalist theories . It both built on and broke with structuralism, making deconstructio n
the differences among them . The signifier bat is distinguishable from hat, for exam- one of several poststructuralist theories that find their commonality in the idea tha t
ple, because they have different initial letters . Words cannot be defined in isolation , although some structuralist principles can be used to form a new understanding o f
because they exist as a chain formed by relationships with other words . Language , reality, the earlier theorists did not take their ideas to their logical conclusions . Tha t
then, is arbitrary, conventional, and based on difference . assumption led to several significant differences between the two groups .
The concept of difference has additional ramifications that become important i n For one thing, the poststructuralists objected that the structuralist interpretation s
deconstruction theory . This concept appears most clearly as opposites, which struc- of texts are too static and unchanging, producing readings that posit fixed meanings .
turalists and others refer to as binary oppositions . They are contrasting concepts, Derrida attributed the problem to the structuralists' acceptance of a transcendenta l
such as male/female, right/left, day/night, each of which makes it possible for us t o signified . As he pointed out, a concept of constant, universal meaning would be essen -
understand the other more fully . We are able to understand black because we under - tial as an orienting point in such a closed-off system . The poststructuralists argue d
stand white, noise because we know silence . instead that texts are fluid, dynamic entities that are given new life with repeated read -
Although structuralism has taken varied forms in different countries, the mos t ings and through interactions with other texts, thereby providing an ongoing pluralit y
influential theorists have been the French followers of Saussure . His ideas and theirs of meanings . Another objection was that although the structuralists seemed to hav e
have been adopted and adapted by many disciplines in addition to linguistics . After provided a broadly applicable new method of arriving at meaning through an analysi s
all, wherever there is social behavior, there is likely to be a signifying system, though of underlying codes and rules, what a text means and how it means simply cannot be
 a nr~~ ~la.~~vU vGUVIV J IRUL. IIV IV

determined, because it is not possible to systematically find the grammar of a text . Saussure's theory that language is a system based on differences, Derrida went a ste p
Meaning, they argued, is essentially undecidable, thereby denying the structural- further, stating that any given signifier may point to several different signifieds . Fo r
ists ' belief in the possibility of establishing objective knowledge through systemati c example, a statement as uncomplicated as "The cherries are in the bowl" says mor e
observation and logical deduction . For example, the poststructuralists point out tha t than the six words denote . The signifier "cherries" will evoke in our consciousness, an d
in a single text one can find many meanings, all of them possible and all of the m that of our listener/reader, a host of associations—other fruit, a still life, desserts, tree s
replaceable by others . Instead of looking for structure, then, deconstruction looks fo r in bloom, allergies—obviously more than cherries in a bowl . Each of the signified s
those places where texts contradict, and thereby deconstruct, themselves . Instead o f (other fruit, a still life, and so on), in turn, becomes a signifier, because it leads to othe r
showing how the conventions of a text work, deconstruction shows how they falter . Th e associations, or other signifieds . In short, a signifier has no single signified, or menta l
result is that a literary work can no longer have one unifying meaning that an author - concept, as the structuralists assume but instead leads to a chain of other signifiers .
ity (critic or author) can enunciate. Instead, meaning is accepted to be the outgrowt h The seemingly simple explanation of sign = signifier + signified can be compli-
of various signifying systems within the text that may even produce contradictor y cated in other ways as well . A person can speak ironically, for instance, saying on e
meanings . One additional difference between the two groups is that the structuralist s thing but meaning another . Imagine that you say to someone who has just run a sto p
assume a scientific stance, which is reflected in the detached tone of their writing and sign and hit your car while driving over the speed limit, "How could you have run int o
their tendency to discuss abstract topics . The poststructuralists, on the other hand , me? You say you were driving so carefully ." Although you would seem to be sympa-
tend to be more passionate and emotional . thetic to the other driver, you are actually accusing him of being irresponsible behin d
In the 1970s, deconstruction became a major force in literary criticism, in larg e the wheel . Tone of voice can also be meaningful . It can, by exaggeration, indicate
part because of the strong influence of its originator and namer, the philosopher Jacques irony. It may also indicate a specially intended meaning behind a statement . By chang -
Derrida . Derrida's main precursors were Friedrich Nietzsche and Martin Heidegger , ing the vocal emphasis to different words, you change the meaning . For example, try
(1889–1976) both known for their probing of such key concepts as knowledge, truth , reading the second sentence aloud, stressing the first use of the word you : "You say yo u
and identity. In the United States, deconstruction became closely associated with Yale were driving so carefully." What does the statement imply? It suggests that the perso n
University, because some of deconstruction's better-known advocates were on the fac - who caused the accident is being defensive but is alone in claiming innocence . Now
ulty . In fact, in many people's minds, deconstruction remains closely associated wit h emphasize the second you and see how the meaning shifts . "You say you were drivin g
(and is sometimes referred to as) the Yale school of criticism . so carefully" implies that the other driver has accused you of some improper drivin g
The impact of deconstruction has not been welcomed by all readers, some of practice . And so precise meaning slips away, suggesting many meanings, rather than a
whom object that it robs literature of its significance, trivializes texts as simpl e single, fixed, clearly identifiable one as the structuralist principles defined.
wordplay, and presents itself in unintelligible jargon . Humanists see deconstructio n Saussure argued that language refers not to objective reality but to mental con-
as a wedge between literature and life, even as a practice that shuts out ordinar y cepts . In deconstructive terms, it does not even refer to mental concepts but only t o
readers unwilling to engage in the complex theorizing that deconstruction requires . itself . It consists of the ongoing play of signifiers that never come to rest . Our think-
In response, its defenders point out that it gives us a way to read more criticall y ing, then, is always in flux, always subject to changing signifiers that move from on e
and honestly than previous systems have allowed us to do . It also provides a mean s to another . We may wish for stability, but we are caught in language, which refuses
of discovering premises and ideologies that lurk unacknowledged in the languag e to stay fixed . Such play does produce illusory effects of meanings, but the seemin g
we use . significations are the results of a trace, which consists of what remains from the
play of signifiers . Because we recognize a word by its differences from other words ,
it continues to have traces of those that it is not . A word, which is present, signal s
PRACTICING DECONSTRUCTIO N what is absent . Derrida called this ongoing play différance, a deliberately ambiguou s
coined term combining the French words for "to defer" and "to differ," suggestin g
Working from the assumption that language is inherently ambiguous and not the that meaning is always postponed, leaving in its place only the differences between
clear, efficient communicator we would like to think it is, deconstruction recognize s signifiers . (Interestingly, in spoken French, différance cannot be distinguished fro m
that any human utterance has a multitude of possibilities for meaning . The simples t différence, making its meaning even more uncertain .) Di/prance asserts that knowl-
statement may be heard in a variety of ways, giving language a tendency to under- edge comes from dissimilarity and absence, making it dynamic and contextual . When
mine itself by refuting what it appears to be saying . It contradicts itself as it move s these ideas are applied to a text, the concept of différance makes it impossible to think
from one meaning to another. How does this happen ? about that work in isolation . The meaning of any given text will be derived from it s
In deconstructive terms, Saussure's sign—the combination of a signifier and a interrelatedness with other texts in an ongoing process that gives it a series of possibl e
signified that refers to a mental concept—is not a stable, unchanging entity . Using meanings and readings .
 Many people are made uncomfortable by the absence of a stable meaning . When One binary opposition of particular importance to Derrida was that of speech /
they realize the extended consequences of such a proposition, they are likely to be eve n writing . He objected to the practice of making speech the privileged member, a con-
more disquieted, for if meaning is derived from what is not there—absence—and i t vention he called phonocentrism, because it implies that the presence of a speaker
is, in the end, undecidable, then there is no such thing as objective truth . As Derrid a makes communication more direct and accurate . Written words, which are merel y
explained it, there is no transcendental signified, no ultimate reality or end to all the ref- copies of speech, are traditionally deemed to be inferior, because they are les s
erences from one sign to another, no unifying element to all things . Human beings resis t directly connected to the source . Speech is evidence of the presence of the speaker,
an existence that lacks the certainty of unchanging meaning, a fixed center, because, a s but writing, which serves when the speaker is not there, points to absence . The binary
Derrida pointed out, humankind, at least in the Western world, is logocentric ; that is, emerging from this situation is presence/absence, with the former—declared throug h
human beings want to believe that there is a centering principle in which all belief an d speaking—the privileged term . This is an essentially logocentric position, because i t
actions are grounded and that certain metaphysical ideas are to be favored over others . puts the human being in the center, announcing his or her presence through language .
They want to believe that there is a presence behind language and text . Throughout his - It asserts presence (being) through speaking .
tory such a center has been given many names : truth, God, Platonic form, essence . The If there is no transcendental signified, no objective truth, then such binaries ar e
salient characteristic, regardless of the name, is that each is stable and ongoing . Eac h not fixed and static . They are fluid and open to change . They can, said Derrida, be
provides an absolute from which all knowledge proceeds . reversed . Any center can be decentered, thereby providing a new set of values an d
Actually, this type of thinking goes back to Aristotle, who declared that some - beliefs . At the very least, such a reversal makes it possible to see any given situatio n
thing cannot have a property and not have it, leading to the dualistic thinking char- from a new perspective . A bigger assertion is that by reversing the oppositions —
acteristic of Western civilization . Such reasoning is most apparent in the tendency o f displacing accepted meaning and reinscribing new values—one is able to get outsid e
Western metaphysics to see the world in terms of pairs of opposed centers of mean- logocentric thought . Not only did Derrida reverse the speech/writing binary to se e
ing, or binary oppositions . As on other occasions, Derrida borrowed the idea from th e the terms in a new way, but he actually argued that writing must come before speech .
structuralists, then elaborated on it by noting that in every such pair one member i s That is, he reasoned that speech is a form of writing ; the two share certain features ,
privileged, or favored, over the other. For example, in the binary oppositions of male / as they are both signifying systems . When we interpret oral signs, we must do so b y
female, good/evil, or truth/lies, the first in each pair is traditionally held by society recognizing a pure form of the signifier, one that can be repeated (and recognized )
to be superior. The privileged member defines itself by what it is not, its less-valued again and again, despite differences of pronunciation . But being capable of repeti-
partner. Not only do such oppositions exist among abstractions, but they also underli e tion is a characteristic of writing, whereas speech vanishes into the air . Because th e
all human acts . The ideology of a situation or a text can be determined by locating th e repeatable signifier gives speech a characteristic of writing, Derrida said it is a specia l
binary oppositions in it and noting which are the privileged members . kind of writing .
Poststructuralists test binary oppositions to determine whether they are indee d Complicating the situation is the idea that binary oppositions may overlap eac h
opposed, to challenge traditional assumptions and beliefs about what should be (an d other . They are not necessarily discrete entities . There are too many contradiction s
is) privileged, to question where they overlap and on what occasions they share thei r and associations involved with language to be able to separate them entirely . At
existence . The poststructuralists, including those who read from a deconstructive per - the same time that they reinforce presence, they also remind us of what is missing ,
spective, point out that oppositions are sometimes not so contrasting as they are though t thereby complementing each other . Derrida referred to the unstable relationship o f
to be . Perhaps something can be present and absent at the same time . Perhaps, they binary oppositions as supplementation, suggesting that each of the two terms adds
suggest, looking at the world as a series of opposed centers of meaning—such as right / something to the other and takes the place of the other . In his hands, for example ,
wrong, good/evil, love/hate—oversimplifies its nature . Such thinking does not take writing not only adds something to speech but also substitutes for it, though th e
into account the complexity of the way things are, leading to distortions of the truth . substitution is never exact ; it is never precisely what it completes . Supplementation
Deconstruction requires that we suspend notice of contradictions in our effor t exists in all aspects of human life and behavior .
to maintain the conventionally accepted arrangement of absolutes . It resists such The various ideas traditionally subscribed to by Western civilization are base d
simplification by reversing the oppositions, thereby displacing meaning, overturnin g on the assumption that conscious, integrated selves are at the center of human activ-
hierarchies, and offering another set of possibilities of meaning that arise from th e ity. Derrida called that belief the metaphysics of presence . These ideas include ou r
new relations of difference . Whenever a group seeks to reverse traditional hierarchie s logocentrism (ties to words), our phonocentrism (ties to words produced as sounds) ,
or destabilize privileged binaries, deconstruction becomes a valuable tool . In literary and our acceptance of a transcendental signified (ultimate source of all knowledge) .
criticism, consequently, deconstructive strategies are often imported into other critica l In short, they are beliefs about language and being that have been influential sinc e
approaches, such as feminist readings or those based on queer theory, as a way t o Plato . But Derrida challenged these beliefs as flawed and erroneous, because mean-
change social attitudes and perceptions . ing is, in the end, undecidable . He defined the metaphysics of presence as "a set of
themes whose character was the sign of a whole set of long-standing constraints, " the text in question which will unravel it all, or the loose stone which will pull dow n
adding that "these constraints were practiced at the price of contradictions, o f the whole building . The deconstruction, rather, annihilates the ground on which th e
denials, of dogmatic degrees ." Furthermore, Derrida "proposed to analyze the non - building stands by showing that the text has already annihilated the ground, know -
closed and fissured system of these constraints under the name of logocentrism i n ingly or unknowingly . Deconstruction is not a dismantling of the structure of a tex t
but a demonstration that it has already dismantled itself .
the form that it takes in Western philosophy ." By deconstructing these constraints ,
he tried to open new ways of thinking and knowing . In terms of texts, he gave read- Such definitions are helpful, but how does the deconstructive critic go about "unrav-
ers a new way to read . eling" the text or finding a writer's blind spots or a text's "gaps, aberrations, or incon-
sistencies " ? The process is actually somewhat similar to the one used in formalism .
That is, the reader engages in a very close reading of the text, noting the presence an d
MAKING A DECONSTRUCTIVE ANALYSI S operation of all its elements . However, the ends of the two approaches are radicall y
different. Whereas formalism seeks to demonstrate that a work has essential unit y
To understand the discussion that follows, you will need to read "Stopping b y despite the paradoxes and irony that create its inner tension, that it expresses a realiz-
Woods on a Snowy Evening," a poem by Robert Frost, found on page 265 . able truth, deconstruction seeks to show that a text has no organic unity or basis fo r
presenting meanings, only a series of conflicting significations .
Whereas a traditional critical reading attempts to establish a meaning for a text, a One way to begin is to follow Derrida's own process, which he called "doubl e
deconstructive reading involves asking questions in an effort to show that what th e reading . " That is, you first go through a text in a traditional manner, pointing ou t
text claims to be saying is different from what the text is really saying (which, o f where it seems to have determinate meanings . The first step in deconstructing Frost' s
course, is acknowledged to be provisional) . It tries to undermine the work's implie d "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening," for example, might be to make a com-
claim of having coherence, unity, and meaning and to show that it does not represen t mentary on the narrator's desire for peace, the highly controlled form, or the cumu-
the truth of its subject . In fact, no final statement about its meaning can be made, fo r lative effect of the images of night, winter, and sleep . On second reading, however ,
each reading is provisional, just one in a series of interpretations that decenter eac h you would question what is accepted in the poem as natural or self-evident, lookin g
other in ongoing play . In the absence of a transcendental signified, a text cannot b e to find places where the attitudes or assumptions identified on first reading are con-
said to be tied to some center that existed before and outside it, and meaning can hav e tradicted or undermined . When incompatible meanings are brought to light, the tex t
no place to conclude, nothing in which to be subsumed . deconstructs itself. These incompatible meanings undermine the grounds on whic h
A number of people have tried to summarize the process of deconstructing a text . the text is based, and meaning becomes indeterminate . The text is not unitary an d
Derrida himself explained it by saying that "the reading must always aim at a cer- unified in the manner that logocentrism promises . Recognizing that a text has mul-
tain relationship, unperceived by the writer, between what he commands and what h e tiple interpretations, the reader expects to interpret it over and over again . No singl e
does not command of the patterns of the language that he uses" As Sharon Crowle y reading is irrevocable ; it can always be displaced by a subsequent one . Thus interpre-
describes the process in Teacher's Introduction to Deconstruction, it tries to "teas e tation becomes a creative act as important as the text undergoing interpretation . Th e
larger systemic motifs out of gaps, aberrations, or inconsistencies in a given text ." It pleasure lies in the discovery of new ways of seeing the work . Of course, because th e
tries to find blind spots that a writer has absorbed from cultural systems . She adds that reader must express those discoveries in logocentric language, the interpretation wil l
"deconstruction amounts to reading texts in order to rewrite them," just as Derrida trie d deconstruct itself as well .
"to reread Western history to give voice to that which has been systematically silenced . " How do you find alternative meanings, especially if you are accustomed t o
(Paul de Man has perhaps had the most to say about "blind spots" In Blindness an d assuming that there is an inherent meaning to be found, that it will be recognizabl e
Insight, he goes so far as to assert that critics achieve insight through their "peculia r to other readers, and that the picture it gives of the world will be consonant with th e
blindness ." He finds that they say something besides what they mean . ) way the world really is? How do you find contradictory or incompatible meanings i f
Barbara Johnson's frequently quoted definition of deconstruction says that i t you are used to finding the meaning of a text or passage ?
occurs by "the careful teasing out of warring forces of signification within the You can begin by locating the binary oppositions in the text, identifying the membe r
text itself." Jonathan Culler says that "to deconstruct a discourse is to show how i t that is privileged and the one that is not . All key terms and characters are defined by thei r
undermines the philosophy it asserts, or the hierarchical oppositions on which i t oppositions, and the deconstructive reader will show how the pairs are mutually depen-
relies ." A more detailed comment comes from J. Hillis Miller : dent but also unstable. In "Stopping by Woods," for example, a number of hierarchica l
Deconstruction as a mode of interpretation works by a careful and circumspect enter - oppositions are quickly noted : silence/sound, nature/civilization, isolation/community ,
ing of each textual labyrinth . . . The deconstructive critic seeks to find, by this pro- dark/light, stillness/activity, unconscious/conscious, and, by implication, death/lif e
cess of retracing, the element in the system studied which is alogical, the thread in and dreams/reality . Looking at them carefully will give you a way of entering the poem
deconstructively. For example, try to answer the following questions about the hierarchi- are privileged by the protagonist even though they are incompatible . The opposed condi -
cal oppositions, and then compare your answers with the commentary that follows each . tions cannot exist together, though that is never overtly acknowledged in the poem . Their
incongruity underscores the fragmented, conflicted nature of the traveler himself. It also
• What values and ideas do the hierarchies reflect? Your answer will define som e
asserts the lack offixed, unchanging meaning in poems or in life itself
of the preconceptions that influence the way the text is conventionally read .
If you accept the first of each paired term to be the privileged one, you will read the poem • What else do the terms make you think of? What other hierarchies do the y
as a statement about the value of experiencing peace, oneness with nature, acceptance of lead to? Such associations will suggest alternative readings, new terms that ca n
self There is beauty in the moment and a sense of connection with primeval forces. decenter the ones currently controlling the interpretation .

• What do you find when you reverse the binary oppositions? What fresh perspec- Earlier it was noted that stillness, silence, isolation, and the rest seem, by extension ,
to suggest the unconscious and death . By establishing unconscious/conscious and
tives on the poem emerge? Because the hierarchy is arbitrary and illusory, i t death/life as major oppositions, the old reading about promises and duties is decen-
can be turned upside down to provide a new view of the values and beliefs tha t tered and replaced with an interpretation having to do with renunciation of vitality
underlie it . The new, unconventional relationships may radically change you r
and presence, a quite different set of concerns. In this way, the chain of signifiers
perception of the terms or of the text . rolls over and over, moving from one provisional meaning to another .
The interesting aspect of the oppositions in this poem is that the "privileged" term s
• How do the binary terms supplement each other? How does each help the reade r
throughout most of it are reversed at the end when the traveler chooses to continu e
understand its opposing term? How do they reinforce both presence and absence ?
his journey. For the first three stanzas, silence is favored over sound, nature over civ -
ilization, isolation over community, and so on. When, however, the persona reject s At the end of Frost's poem, when the narrator exchanges the peace of aloneness
the loveliness of the dark, deep woods and chooses to honor promises that lie outsid e (isolation) for reengagement with the world, nature and civilization, and countrysid e
them, he acknowledges that he lives in a world that expects him to renounce self- and village, are not opposites ; rather they are experiences in the being of the narrato r
indulgent dreams and carry out his obligations . He is part of a society that honor s that decenter and supplement each other. He is attracted by the solace of the winte r
community, activity, consciousness, and reality. scene in the woods, but he chooses the world of obligations and work. He is not, of
Although in this case the poet himself has provided a reversal, the reader stil l course, a unified being but a fragmented one who speaks from the unconscious an d
must ask what has been changed by it . What else is affected? What would be different , returns at the end to the conscious world . He exists in dream and reality .
for example, if the traveler opted for nature, darkness, and dreams? What if the force s
Another deconstructive approach is to take what has heretofore seemed marginal an d
that attracted him so powerfully throughout most of the experience remained the privi -
make it central . Elements customarily considered to be of minor interest can becom e
leged ones? What would be different if isolation were deemed to be more attractiv e
than community? What if it were preferable to be alone, outside the company offriends the focus of interest, with binary oppositions and possible reversals of their own . Th e
and family? Then the woods would belong to nobody, or at least the narrator woul d comment that ordinarily receives little attention is brought to the center to see wha t
not acknowledge their claim, and there would be no self-consciousness about bein g new understandings surface, or a minor character may be scrutinized as critical to
observed . Conformity to social norms and pressures (signaled by the horse) would ceas e what happens in the plot . For example, in "Stopping by Woods," a close look at th e
to exist. The world would be marked by an absence of stress and the presence ofpeace. horse is revealing . Seemingly of slight importance to what happens in the poem o r
The narrator would be liberated from drudgery labor, the burdens of responsibility, what it may mean, the horse turns out to be surprisingly significant . Described in thi s
which are implied by the penultimate line . Structure and regimentation would disappear, poem as "little" ("My little horse must think it queer / To stop without a farmhous e
and in their place would be spontaneity and natural reactions . And perhaps most impor- near"), he turns out to play a large role . He "gives his harness bells a shake," thereb y
tant, one would feel a sense ofunity with nature . To be alone is for the moment appealing,
reminding the narrator of responsibility, duty, and social judgments . He interrupts the
and this overturned hierarchy offers a new and provisional center of meaning.
silence with sound, supplanting the peacefulness of the moment with a call to activ-
• Do you find any contradictions in the privileged members? Or are the y ity and conformity, replacing absence with presence . The horse becomes, in a sense ,
incompatible ? the voice of the conscious and civilized world, which in itself is a commentary o n
The privileged terms silence, isolation, stillness, and unconscious initially seem to fit that world . Nevertheless, the traveler exchanges his dreams for reality . The horse' s
easily into a single scene, but on closer analysis, some inconsistencies emerge . There are bells, sounds that are not even language, displace isolation as a center of meanin g
contradictions in the poem that go unacknowledged . For example, the traveler enjoy s and thereby change the direction of the poem . The animal's impact would easily g o
the pleasures of isolation but ultimately opts for community. He savors the beauty of unnoticed, except that the deconstructionist moves him to center stage .
nature but chooses civilization . When he continues his journey, isolation and nature ar e Any "hidden" contradictions and discrepancies between what the text seems t o
decentered by community and civilization . In the end, contradictory hierarchies (isola - say and what it actually says are important . Such incongruities are often found i n
tion/community and community/isolation, nature/civilization and civilization/nature) what is not said, in gaps of information, silences, tensions, questions, or sometimes
 figures of speech . The author's intent is of no help in this process, because what th e of shifting meanings challenges the previously held views of the reader, offering he r
author thinks was said may not be the case at all . In fact, by identifying those place s freedom from the constraints of traditional assumptions and ideologies so that ne w
where a slip of language occurs that is, where something is said that was not mean t ways of seeing are made possible .
to be said you have found a point at which a text begins to deconstruct itself . B y
discovering a pattern of such inconsistencies and trying to account for it, a differ-
ent interpretation becomes possible . The reader of this poem wonders, for instance, WRITING A DECONSTRUCTIVE ANALYSI S
about the distance between the terms used to describe the woods . They are said t o
be "lovely, dark, and deep ." The first descriptive word connotes aesthetic pleasure , It should be noted at the outset that important voices have expressed concern abou t
the next two a sense of threat or mystery . The solace that the narrator imputes to th e the appropriateness of viewing deconstruction as a critical approach . Not surpris-
woods is threatened . It is, finally, not there, or at least it is there only momentarily. ingly, some critics resist what they see as the negativism found in deconstruction' s
The woods have no permanent, stable, consistent self . philosophical attack on the existence of meaning in literature (and life) . Others
Looking at a binary opposition, such as presence/absence, for example , object less to its destructive effects than to what they see as its tendency to triv-
reversed by Derrida so that absence is favored, often helps a reader deconstruct a ialize literature and the act of reading, thereby threatening the privileged plac e
text . In "Stopping by Woods," it is significant that the narrator's words come unspo- those people hold in academia . They accuse deconstruction of diminishing ou r
ken from the inner self . They appear to exist only in thought . Phonocentric view s capacity to appreciate and interpret literature . And almost everyone complain s
would give them a privileged position because they are closest to the man . The y of its obscure and confusing terminology . David Hirsch's The Deconstruction of
represent him, stand in for him, displace him . The inner words ultimately appea r Literature, John Ellis's Against Deconstruction, and David Lehman's Signs of th e
in writing, however, displacing speech (which in this case is unvoiced), whic h Times : Deconstruction and the Fall of Paul de Man, for example, all question th e
displaced unspoken thought, which initially displaced the man . The presence o f validity of this approach .
being is far removed . The words of the persona supplement (act as additions to an d Another kind of objection comes from Jane Tompkins, who argues against th e
substitutions for) him . Further, the bells of the horse metaphorically make the hors e practice of applying poststructuralist principles to texts, because it means usin g
a spokesperson for the community, thereby displacing the horse's center . Sound has methods that are basically positivist and empirical and thereby contradictory t o
replaced speech . Animal has replaced people . Absence is thereby privileged ove r deconstruction .
presence .
The point I want to make here is that you can't apply post-structuralism to literar y
In sum, the narrator of "Stopping by Woods" is seen to be a logocentric bein g
texts . Why not? Because to talk about applying post-structuralism to literary text s
who looks for a center where there is none . Finding only momentary meaning, h e
assumes the following things : (I) that we have freestanding subjects, (2) that we hav e
moves on to seek a center in work and community. He yearns for peace but displace s freestanding objects of investigation, (3) that there are freestanding methods, and (4 )
it with obligations, because although unity is desirable, it is absent, only fleetingl y that what results when we apply reader to method and method to text is a freestand -
available in the moment in the woods . ing interpretation . This series of assumptions revokes everything that Derrida i s
Finally, the deconstructive reader will place all structures in question, becaus e getting at in "Différance, " and that is implicit in Saussure's theory of language . . .
an ultimate meaning is always deferred, and ambiguity remains . The purpose is to As we read literary texts, then, "we" are not applying a "method" ; we are acting a s
decenter each new center, to cast doubt on previous theories, never coming to res t an extension of the interpretive code, of those systems of difference that constitut e
on any one meaning but generating an infinite number of possible interpretations . us and the objects of our perception simultaneously .
The meaning of the protagonist's experience in "Stopping by Woods," for example , Nevertheless, deconstructive readings can enrich one's experience with a text b y
cannot be determined in the long run . The repetition of the last line resists interpre- providing an ongoing journey through it, with each journey revealing a new way of
tation or provides multiple readings, because its metaphoric ramifications remai n thinking about the text . Although such studies proceed in different ways, here are
ambiguous, unclear, full of possibilities, none of them final . some suggestions to help you read from this perspective and to write about you r
On subsequent readings, new levels of meaning will emerge with the inversio n observations .
of other binary oppositions . Some will appear only after others have been explored .
You may find yourself moving back and forth between different interpretations o r
successively displacing one with another . In either case, the unending play o f PREWRITIN G
différance prevents you from arriving at any decidable meaning, or any set of mul- A reading log can be particularly helpful with the deconstructive approach . As you
tiple meanings, for anything you say or write . Instead, there is an unending process , go through a text for the first time, you can make notes as a formalist would, takin g
with every new reading holding the possibility of a new interpretation . Acceptance an interest in how meaning grows out of the work's various stylistic elements . You
 will identify tensions (in the form of paradox and irony) and be aware of how they ar e DRAFTING AND REVISIN G
resolved . You will take note of how images, figurative language, and symbols com e
together to make a unified whole (see Chapter 3) . During the second reading, you ca n The Introductio n
set aside your willingness to accept that there is an identifiable, stable meaning pro- Given that deconstructive readings seek to displace previous ones, and sometime s
duced by the diction, imagery, symbols, and the rest and begin to probe unresolved , to decenter standard, generally accepted interpretations, one way to open the dis-
unexplained, or unmentioned matters . In your reading log, you should record th e cussion is to reiterate the conventional reading of a text . In other words, the intro-
undeveloped concerns that would, if they were explored, interrupt the assumed unit y duction may simply be a restatement of the usual perception of what a work mean s
and meaning of the text .
or of how it operates . By explaining how a story is usually read or how a characte r
The prewriting stage is also a good time to play with the binary opposition s is normally perceived, you have a basis for deconstructing those views . Once yo u
that you find, first identifying those that initially seem most significant, then infer - have established what is usually deemed to be so, you are set to state why it is no t
ring the ideology that they present . You can recognize them by noting where the
the only possible reading . Your argument for multiple readings will be the centra l
text makes a clear distinction between two items of the same genus : black/white focus of the body of the discussion that follows, but it is helpful to introduce tha t
(colors), men/women (gender), and so on . You can determine which is privilege d
idea early on .
by asking what the text accepts as normal, natural, worthy of being or doing . Th e
next step, as noted in "Making a Deconstructive Analysis," is to reverse the terms ,
thereby creating an inversion of the recognizable world, a new world that is paral- The Body
lel to the world you are used to . This, in turn, allows you to look at the work in a n
unaccustomed manner . You can also look for contradictions in the binary terms b y Your purpose in the body of your deconstructive analysis will be to demonstrate the
noting how each defines itself against its opposite or determine how they supple- limited perspective of the conventional reading . You may want to show how the ideol-
ment each other by showing how a term that seems complete in itself is actuall y ogy that the text tries to support is not supportable, an approach that is popular wit h
derived from something else . Even the most unified act or being is dependent o n Marxist and feminist deconstructive critics. In this case, as you study a particular
others for its existence, making all things incomplete or fragmented . It is likel y text, you will also be deconstructing the larger contexts in which it exists . You will be
that some of the steps in this process will help you find, in the terms of J . Hilli s suggesting, or overtly stating, that the order supported by it is also open to question ,
Miller, "the thread in the text in question which will unravel it all, or the loose ston e perhaps itself fraught with inconsistencies and illusory stability .
which will pull down the whole building ." And that is an important point, becaus e On the other hand, you may be more interested in presenting a series of possibl e
deconstruction works not simply to reverse binaries but also to deconstruct entir e readings, one decentering the other in an ongoing process . This approach will tak e
hierarchies by illustrating their inherent instability . the discussion a step further by showing how meaning is not simply an either-o r
Another prewriting activity involves examining the language of the text . You can situation but an unending series of possibilities, leaving meaning ultimately beyon d
begin by looking for paradoxes and contradictions, then move on to examining th e deciding . In either case, you will want to demonstrate how and where the text fall s
figurative language . By making a list of metaphors, for example, you have informa- apart because of its own inconsistencies, misstatements, or contradictions .
tion that may reveal slippages of the language . Because figures of speech do not mea n The thinking you did during the prewriting stage will be valuable here, bu t
what they literally say, there is room for them to misstate what the author intended fo r remember that all assertions need to be supported with quotations and example s
them to say . You may find it helpful to put the phrases on paper and then play wit h drawn from the text . The following questions can help you generate the basis of you r
their possibilities in writing . discussion . If you developed your prewriting stage thoroughly, you will have alread y
A more global view of the text involves looking for shifts in point of view, time , covered some of these questions .
voice, vocabulary, or tone, because such shifts may signal that the narrative or th e What is the primary binary opposition in the text ?
narrator (speaker) of the work is not unified or stable . What seems to be coherent i s What associated binary oppositions do you find?
actually fraught with contradictions and conflicts . When these cannot be resolved , Which terms in the oppositions are privileged?
the text is said to have reached the point at which it deconstructs itself, a point know n What elements in the work support the privileged terms ?
as aporia. What statement of values or beliefs emerges from the privileged terms ?
Much of the prewriting suggested here involves listing and note making . Althoug h What elements in the text contradict the hierarchies as presented ?
these strategies will aid analysis, they will be helpful in the drafting stage only insofa r Where is the statement of values or beliefs contradicted by characters, events, o r
as they provide ideas and information . Consequently, the more material you can gener - statements in the text ?
ate at this point, the better off you will be when you begin to write your first draft . Are the privileged terms inconsistent? Do they present conflicting meanings?
 JUVVL' J1GU1\GHUl1VV 1V y

What associations do you have with the terms that complicate their opposition ? Metaphysics of presence Beliefs including binary oppositions, logocentrism, and phono-
That is, what associations keep you from accepting that the terms are all goo d centrism that have been the basis of Western philosophy since Plato .
or all bad ? Parole Individual verbalizations within the system called langue.
What new possibilities of understanding emerge when you reverse the binar y Phenomenological critics Critics whose philosophical perspective assumes that a think-
ing subject and the object of which it is aware are inseparable . The Geneva critics, wh o
oppositions ?
read a text as the consciousness of an author put into words, are often described a s
How does the reversal of oppositions tear down the intended statement of meaning ?
practicing phenomenological criticism .
What contradictions of language, image, or event do you notice ?
Phonocentrism The belief that speech is privileged over writing .
Are there any significant omissions of information ? Poststructuralism Theories (including deconstruction, new historicism, and neo-Freudia n
Can you identify any irreconcilable views offered as coherent systems ? theory) that are based on Ferdinand de Saussure's linguistic concepts but that at the sam e
What is left unnoticed or unexplained ? time undermine them .
How would a focus on different binary oppositions lead to a differen t Semiology A science proposed by Saussure that investigates meaning through signs observ -
interpretation ? able in cultural phenomena .
Where are the figures of speech so ambiguous that they suggest several (perhap s Sign The combination of a signifier and a signified .
contradictory) meanings ? Signified The concept of meaning indicated by a signifier .
What usually overlooked minor figures or events can be examined as major ones ? Signifier A conventional sound utterance or written mark .
How does the focus of meaning shift when you make marginal figures central ? Structuralism A science that seeks to understand how systems work . Those who practice it tr y
to describe the underlying (and not necessarily visible) principles by which systems exist .
What new vision of the situation presented by the text emerges for you ?
Supplementation The unstable relationship between two binary oppositions that keep s
What new complications do you see that the conventional reading would hav e
them from being totally separate entities .
"smoothed over" ?
Synchronic An approach to the study of language that searches for the principles that gover n
Why can you not make a definitive statement about the meaning of the text ? its functions by examining a language at one particular point in time .
Trace The illusory effect of meaning that is left in a signifier by other signifiers—that is ,
what it is not .
The Conclusion
Transcendental signified A fixed, ultimate center of meaning.
If you have begun by rehearsing the conventional reading of the text under analysis, a n Übermensch Nietzsche's strong, independent "superman" of the future who would be free d
effective way to end your essay is by comparing that understanding with your deconstruc- of all values except those he held to be valid .
tive analysis, pointing out why the earlier one is not definitive. If you prefer, you may
reiterate the several different ways in which the text can be read, thereby making the poin t SUGGESTED READIN G
that meaning is always provisional, always ready to give way to other meaning .
Abrams, M . H . "The Deconstructive Angel ." Critical Inquiry 3 (1977) : 425-438 .
Crowley, Sharon . A Teacher's Introduction to Deconstruction . Urbana, IL : National Counci l
•• of Teachers of English, 1989 .
Culler, Jonathan . On Deconstruction : Theory and Criticism after Structuralism . Ithaca ,
GLOSSARY OF TERMS USEFU L NY: Cornell UP, 1982 .
IN UNDERSTANDING DECONSTRUCTIO N Derrida, Jacques . A Derrida Reader. Ed . Peggy Kamuf. New York : Columbia UP, 1991 .
. Of Grammatology. Trans . Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak . Baltimore : Johns Hopkin s
Aporia A point in a text where contradictions cannot be resolved, causing it to deconstruct itself . UP, 1998.
Binary opposition A dichotomy that is actually an evaluative hierarchy. A binary opposition Johnson, Barbara . The Critical Difference : Essays in the Contemporary Rhetoric of Reading .
Baltimore : Johns Hopkins UP, 1980 .
underlies human acts and practices .
Diachronic An approach to the study of language that traces how and why words hav e Miller, J. Hillis . "Tradition and Difference ." Diacritics 2 (1972) : 6-13 .
evolved in meaning or sound over time. Norris, Christopher . Deconstruction : Theory and Practice . London : Methuen, 1982 .
Différance The term Jacques Derrida used to indicate that meaning is based on differences , Scholes, Robert . "Deconstruction and Criticism ." Critical Inquiry 14 (1988) : 278-295 .
is always postponed, and is ultimately undecidable . Tompkins, Jane . "A Short Course in Post-Structuralism." In Conversations, ed. Charles Moran an d
Langue The structure of a language that is used by all members of a particular languag e Elizabeth Penfield, pp . 19-37 . Urbana, IL : National Council of Teachers of English, 1990 .
community.
Logocentrism The belief in an absolute or foundation that grounds the linguistic system an d CENGAGENOW For up-to-date information on the many Web sites addressing deconstruc-
fixes the meaning of a spoken or written utterance . tion, visit academic .cengage .com/eng/dobie/theoryintopractice2e .