Derrida on language and meaning

Derrida on language and
meaning

Derrida’s most important philosophical influences were without doubt the works of Husserl and Heidegger. In a way, it is in this context that Derrida’s thinking becomes understandable, but it also expands in other directions that take distance from these classics. He claims that he learnt from Husserl a methodological prudence and reserve and a rigorous technique (Derrida 1984: 109). The phenomenological reduction that Husserl developed, the epoché, is central to Derrida’s philosophy. It is a way of interpreting in which the interpreter’s own relation to their surroundings and to what they are interpreting is acknowledged. Derrida uses this method when he reads texts, in this way unveiling some hidden meanings and structures. But Derrida also develops the method further and in doing so applies it to Husserl’s own texts as well. The phenomenological reduction in Derrida’s hands is directed towards the phenomenological tradition itself, in which he functions as a critic but also takes part and continues the tradition. Derrida’s deconstruction is thus not mere criticism in which Husserl would be proved to be wrong, but rather, a case of Derrida developing Husserl’s method further by also showing its weaker points. The problems and contradictions that Derrida is able to show in Husserl’s phenomenological reduction do not derive from the fact that Husserl simply missed something: they show in a significant way how it is generally impossible to reach a method of interpretation that would be infallible (see Kaarto 2008: 11–13).

Derrida’s philosophy is also closely connected with Heidegger’s critique of metaphysics. Important affinities exist between Derrida’s and Heidegger’s thinking, the most prominent perhaps being the notion of ‘deconstruction’ that Derrida develops from Heidegger’s ‘Destruktion’. However, there are also many points on which Derrida’s and Heidegger’s thinking and method differ. Derrida claims an important difference between him and Heidegger in the way they see language. Derrida says that he writes in a different language from Heidegger, which does not mean only that he writes in French and Heidegger in German. He notes that the writers and poets that interest him (for instance Mallarmé and Blanchot) are completely different from those that interest Heidegger (Hölderlin and Rilke) (Derrida 1984: 110; see, also, Miller 2009). Derrida explains this difference in the following way:

Grammatology

Although Saussure sees writing as unrelated to the inner system of language, he does not want to disregard it altogether. Writing is, according to him, continually used to represent language. It is useful, despite its shortcomings and dangers. Derrida points out that writing has been reduced to a tool. It is seen as an instrument that does not always work. The fact that it does not always function perfectly is experienced as fatal, but the problems are understood to concern only writing, not language itself. Writing, in fact, threatens language. Derrida argues that this way of thinking about language has very long roots:

Derrida’s critique of linguistics is a critique of its presuppositions and the definitions and restrictions by which it limits itself and its object of study. There seem to be inconsistencies and hidden meanings in the way that linguistics defines itself. Derrida asks:

According to Derrida, writing is not secondary to language if the logic of first and second is not considered inside the system from which the aim is to exclude the second. Derrida points out that writing cannot be a sign of a sign except if one says it of all signs. Herein lies for Derrida an important message: if every sign refers to a sign, and if a sign of a sign refers to writing, then writing contains something that is inherent in all language (Derrida 1976: 43). Writing, in fact, can tell us important things about language in general.

Derrida thus uses Saussure as an example to show that Western methods of analysis, explication, reading and interpretation are constructed so that they necessarily involve the exclusion of writing and cannot pose the radical question of writing. By looking at the way writing has been understood, Derrida can deconstruct the concept of epistémè and the logocentric metaphysics that are essential in Western thinking.

Thus Derrida wants to think of language differently from what has usually been done in linguistics. To him, language is a possibility founded on the general possibility of writing. Oral language already belongs to writing (Derrida 1976: 55). Here in lies a problem for him. He must redefine ‘writing’ in order to make clear what he means by it. It is not wrong to stay in the structure of language opposed to writing as long as one sees speech and writing in the traditional way. But this way of thinking includes contradictions. The challenge for Derrida is that his own attempt to tackle the problem cannot start from the same origins as the traditional one but has no other base to start from. He thus has to use some of the concepts of that tradition but use them in new ways and give new significations to them. This is one reason why Derrida’s style of writing is at times very difficult to understand.

Language has always been what Derrida calls ‘arche-writing’. It is something that can never be reduced to presence. By using the concept of arche-writing it becomes clear that Derrida’s aim is not simply to disrupt the tradition of the phoneme by replacing it with a theory centred on the graphie instead. Archewriting is a notion on another level, so to speak. It is at work not only in the form and structure of graphic expression but in non-graphic as well. It constitutes the movement of the sign function. This movement Derrida calls ‘différance’, his own neologism (he also uses the form ‘differance’). It means temporalisation and the relationship between non-presence and language. It is the condition of all linguistic systems (Derrida 1976: 60). Here some of the most important elements of Derrida’s theory of language are presented and take form.

The trace is an important notion in Derrida’s philosophy of language because it is closely connected to the way that writing relies on differences.

The trace as différance founds the opposition between signifier and signified (Derrida 1976: 63). Meaning is not something that is present to itself in the unity of the sign. It is not founded on unity but on differences.

Derrida says that meaning derives from différance. A sign can mean something only in a chain or system of differences. It must belong to some figuration in order to function. This way the idea of literal meaning becomes impossible in his theory too. No meaning can be fully present in itself at any time because meaning always implies a reference elsewhere, to other signs and meanings. This is the basic function of the sign. ‘The literal [proper] meaning does not exist, its “appearance” is a necessary function – and must be analyzed as such – in the system of differences and metaphors’ (Derrida 1976: 89). Literal meaning is some kind of fiction. It is the dream in which meaning is present to the logos within its voice, thus being fully present and heard. It is to hear oneself speak and understand absolutely (Derrida 1976: 89).

Writing and supplementarity

If we pay attention to writing instead of speech, and study language, especially its history, from this point of view, we see that we find no simple origin or uncomplicated development. Derrida lists different aspects of this history that show the many important roles that writing has played. The written sign has contributed to many things: all clergies were constituted at the same time as writing and by using writing; strategy, diplomacy, agriculture, fiscality and penal law are linked to writing in both their history and their structure. The origin of writing has in many differing cultures been connected to the exercise of power. Political-administrative power has been practiced through scribes, whose function was irreducible. Ideological, religious, scientific and technical systems have been made possible and have relied upon writing. From all this we see that writing has been much more than a mere means of communication. Derrida also argues that in fact the very sense of power and effectiveness in general, that is, meaning and mastery, was always linked to writing. He says that there could be no law without the possibility of trace (Derrida 1976: 93). This is not meant to be an exposition of the origin of writing but a study of its different origins. The idea is that if we look at writing instead of speech, we get a picture of language, in which we cannot see one simple origin but many different ones connected to different contexts.

By reading Rousseau’s texts, Derrida studies in further detail the connections of language and logocentrism. Rousseau, and in his company Claude Levi-Strauss (a ‘Rousseauist’), represent for Derrida an exemplary position in the history of logocentrism between Plato and Hegel. Therefore, Rousseau seems to be someone through whom we can study the history of metaphysics as the history of being determined by presence, which merges with logocentrism and is produced by reduction of the trace (Derrida 1976: 97–99). Rousseau’s theory of writing is a phase in the complicated structure, in which meaning as presence has been developed.

In context with Saussure, Derrida points out the ethnocentric ideology that privileges phonetic writing over others. It is an ethnocentrism that does not realise its ethnocentrism but makes claims of liberation. It wants to liberate linguistics from writing without questioning the legitimacy of this move. It wants to found a science of authentic language by asserting that human and fully signifying language does not need writing. It wants to say that nothing is missing from peoples who are nevertheless described as ‘without writing’. By this definition, it is, however, already asserted that, in fact, something is missing. These ambiguities can also be found in Levi-Strauss’s texts. He upholds the rigorous distinction between language and writing. This permits the classification of people as those who use writing and those who do not. According to Derrida, Levi-Strauss is not suspicious of these distinctions (Derrida 1976: 119–120). He does not question the ethnocentrism that is included in these classifications.