The article Difference,
by Jacques Derrida, discusses the distinction between words, and distinction
between signs through a semiotic analysis he coined deconstruction. Derrida
suggests deconstruction of texts through binary opposites construct our meaning
and purpose. If we look back to Ferdinand de Saussure to help us
unpack this concept we remember first, “Without language, thought is a vague,
uncharted, nebula”. Thus, we created language to give something meaning or
purpose. The question however, is, how do we ascribe meanings to words? De
Saussure said, “In language there are only differences” and “we only know
things because we know what they are not”. Derrida uses the
concept “metaphysics of presence”, to help understand this, which refers to whatever
is present, never what is absent. Therefore, when a word is selected it simultaneously
means that other words were not selected, making them different. For example if
I were to say the word ‘north’ one would apply all the other words
from the same context in order to find its meaning. As a result, each word
exists in a relationship of dependency with others. As Derrida claims, “Every
concept is necessarily and essentially inscribed in a chain or a system, within
which it refers to another and to other concept, by the systematic play of
differences”. This is serendipitously similar to Macherey theory of intertextuality,
the shaping of a text’s meaning by referring to other texts, everything based
on something before and language is a system of interconnected terms with
meanings derived from the others.
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