POSTSTRUCTURALISM Deconstruction Post structuralism emerged in France in

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POST-STRUCTURALISM Deconstruction

POST-STRUCTURALISM Deconstruction

� Post structuralism emerged in France in the late 1960 s. � Roland Barthes

� Post structuralism emerged in France in the late 1960 s. � Roland Barthes and Jacques Derrida are two important figures associated with this emergence.

Roland Barthes “The Death of the Author” A declaration of radical textual independence: the

Roland Barthes “The Death of the Author” A declaration of radical textual independence: the work is not determined by intention of the author or context. - The text is free by its very nature of all such restraints. - The corollary of the death is the birth of the reader. -

� “The Author, when believed in, is always conceived of as the past of

� “The Author, when believed in, is always conceived of as the past of his own book: book and author stand automatically on a single line divided into a before and an after. The Author is thought to nourish the book, which is to say that he exists before it, thinks, suffers, lives for it, is in the same relation of antecedence to his work as a father to his child, in complete contrast, the modern scriptor is born simultaneously with the text, is in no way equipped with a being preceding or exceeding the writing, is not the subject with the book as predicate; there is no other time than that of the enunciation and every text is eternally written here and now. ”

� A text is made of multiple writings, drawn from many cultures and entering

� A text is made of multiple writings, drawn from many cultures and entering into mutual relations of dialogue, parody, contestation, but there is one place where this multiplicity is focused and that place is reader, not, the AUTHOR. The reader is the space on which all the quotations that make up a writing are inscribed without any of them being lost: a text’s unity lies not in its origin but in its destination. Yet this destination cannot any longer be personal: the reader is without history, biography, psychology; he is simply that someone who holds together in a single field all the traces by which the written text is constituted.

“The birth of the reader must be at the cost of the death of

“The birth of the reader must be at the cost of the death of the author. ”

Jacques Derrida - 1966 lecture “Structure, Sign and Play in the Discourse of the

Jacques Derrida - 1966 lecture “Structure, Sign and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences” -He sees in modern times a particular intellectual event which constitutes a radical break from past ways of thoughts.

� Transcendental Signified � Logocentricism � Binary Oppositions

� Transcendental Signified � Logocentricism � Binary Oppositions

Is post structuralism a continuation and development of structuralism or a form of rebellion

Is post structuralism a continuation and development of structuralism or a form of rebellion against it?

Differences between Structuralism and Poststructuralism � � � Structuralism ultimately derives from linguistics. The

Differences between Structuralism and Poststructuralism � � � Structuralism ultimately derives from linguistics. The world is constructed through language. Structuralism questions our way of structuring and categorizing reality, and prompts us to break free of habitual modes of perception or categorisation, but it believes that we can thereby attain a more reliable view of things. � Post-structuralism is based on philosophy. We are not fully in control of the medium of language, so meanings cannot be planted in set places. � Post-structuralism distrusts the notion of reason, and the idea of the human being as an independent entity, preferring the notion of the “dissolved” or “constructed” subject. �

What seems to be the characteristics of poststructuralism as a critical method? � The

What seems to be the characteristics of poststructuralism as a critical method? � The post-structuralist critic is engaged in the task of “deconstructing” the text. � It is often referred to as “reading against the grain” or “reading the text against itself”. � The deconstructionist practices textual harassment or oppositional reading to unmask internal contradictions or inconsistencies in the text and to show the disunity which underlines its apparent unity.

The differences between structuralism and post-structuralism � Paralels/Echoes � Contradictions/Paradoxes, � Balances � Shift

The differences between structuralism and post-structuralism � Paralels/Echoes � Contradictions/Paradoxes, � Balances � Shift in: Tone, Viewpoint, � Reflections/Repetitions � Symmetry � Contrasts � Patterns � Effect: To show textual unity and coherence What structuralist seeks Tense, Time, Person, Attitude � Conflicts � Absences/Omissions � Linguistic quirks � Aporia � Effect: To show textual disunity What post-structuralist seeks

What post-structuralist critics do? � They “read the text against the itself” so as

What post-structuralist critics do? � They “read the text against the itself” so as to expose what might be thought of as the “textual subconscious” where meanings are expressed which may be directly contrary to the surface meaning. � They fix upon the surface features of the words- similarities in sound, the root meanings of words, a “dead” metaphor and bring these to the foreground so that they become crucial to the overall meaning. � They seek to show that the text is characterized by disunity rather than unity. � They concentrate on a single passage and analyze it so intentionally that it becomes impossible to sustain a “univocal” reading and the language explodes into “multiplicities of meaning”. � They look for shifts and breaks of various kinds in the text and see these as evidence of what is repressed or glossed over or passed over in silence by the text.

The Second Coming by W. Butler Yeats TURNING and turning in the widening gyre

The Second Coming by W. Butler Yeats TURNING and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity. Surely some revelation is at hand; Surely the Second Coming is at hand. The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out When a vast image out of i{Spiritus Mundi} Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert A shape with lion body and the head of a man, A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun, Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds. The darkness drops again; but now I know That twenty centuries of stony sleep Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle, And what rough beast, its hour come round at la. St, Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born? �