Dr. Mark Alfino
Philosophy Department
Gonzaga University
March 26, 2012
Jacques Derrida
July 15, 1930 – October 9,
2004
Postmodern Slogans
 There is nothing outside the text.
 Man is an invention of recent
date. And one perhaps nearing
an end.
 Language speaks us.
Opening Lines of “Structure, Sign,
and Play…” by Jacques Derrida
Opening Lines of “Violence and
Metaphysics” by Jacques Derrida
Postmodern Slogans
 There is nothing outside the text.
 Man is an invention of recent
date. And one perhaps nearing
an end.
 Language speaks us.
Word of the Night:
Semiosis
Semiosis
The general processes of meaning
formation and change studied by
semiotics.
Ferdinand de Saussure,
1857-1913
Saussure’s Concept of the Sign
Image for the Arbitrariness of the
Sign in Saussure
What makes the 8:25 Geneva to
Paris train the 8:25 Geneva to
Paris train?
The “UPS” theory of meaning
Signifier or Signified?
Lamborghini Murciélago Spyder, 300-400K
“Structure, Sign, and Play”
“the play of differences involves syntheses and referrals that
prevent there from being at any moment or in any way a
simple element that is present in and of itself and refers
only to itself. Whether in written or spoken discourse, no
element can function as a sign without relating to another
element which is not simply present. This linkage means
that each “element”—phoneme or grapheme—is
constituted with reference to the trace in it of the other
elements of the sequence or system. This linkage, this
weaving, is the text, which is produced only through the
transformation of another text. Nothing, either in the
elements or in the system, is anywhere simply present or
absent. There are only, everywhere, differences and traces
of traces.”
Derrida, Positions p. 26, in Culler p. 142.
Key Terms
 Metaphysics of Presence
 Logocentrism - Phallogocentrism
 Phonocentrism
 Deconstructive Reading
Postmodern Claims about Meaning
1. There is nothing outside the text.
2. Postmodernism readings defamiliarize ideas.
3. Language speaks us.
4. Presence of meaning is either an illusion or a
careful construct.
5. Stability of meaning requires more explanation
than meaning difference and drift.
Postmodern Claims about Truth (and
Philosophy)
1.
The history of Western philosophy is riddled with a
logocentric, phoncentric, phallogocentric,
metaphysics of presence which perpetuates the
illusion of the possibility of philosophical truth.
2. In light of postmodernism’s critique of meaning and
truth, philosophy remakes itself as a postmetaphysical participant in knowledge work and
cultural criticism.
Dr. Mark Alfino
Philosophy Department
Gonzaga University
March 26, 2012