My Guide to Literary Theory: Post-Structuralism/ Deconstruction

In structuralism, we discovered the theory of a linguistic structure which binds all of our cultural production, but this notion came under continued scrutiny for some of its flawed principles. These critiques of structuralism began to form new ways of looking at and thinking about the textual. One such theory is post-structuralism also known as deconstruction.

Jacques Derrida

Just as structuralism is not purely a literary theory, neither is deconstruction. The textual is not solely the writing we are looking at, but also the entire way we experience the world. Post-structuralism is rather difficult to pin down and is arguably not even theory at all. For the most part, we can consider both post-structuralism and deconstruction as the same theory, and the existence of both terms emerged out of critics arguing over which was more accurate. Jacques Derrida was not happy with the term "post-structuralism" as he believed, whilst his theory concerned structures, it was an anti-structuralist gesture. He believed, "Structures were to be undone, decomposed, desedimented" Hence he preferred the term deconstruction. Both terms are largely interchangeable and refer to the same overarching theoretical principles outlined below.

Jacques Derrida is the principal figure in deconstruction, and it is the principles he outlined in 'Structure, Sign and Play in Human Sciences' that make the basis of the philosophy. (For once this is not a text I recommend reading as it is heavy going and unnecessary to read in full. There are many useful summaries online.)  In the work, Derrida saw a major flaw in the notions of structuralism. If the structuralist claim that all human experiences are textual and are shaped by language is true, then any attempt to deliver a systematic and scientific analysis on a structure that contains no fixed point to measure against is deeply problematic. He believed that the structure of language was one of radical uncertainty, a decentered universe, which becomes evident in the constant anxiety we have over ensuring the language we use is interpreted as we intended.  Derrida claims textual analysis can only happen within the structure, and therefore must be fluid with multiple interpretations. If we think of language as the matrix that we are all plugged into, and experience reality through, we can only make sense of the world from within it. The problem with structuralism is that it attempts to provide a scientific analysis of the structure, an impossibility when we can't unplug our self from the matrix. Instead, our analysis has to come from inside the matrix and focus on determining the power relations that exist within. He says it is the role of a critic to perform what he calls a "doubling commentary". The critic attempts to reconstruct a pre-existing textual reality, but as none exists, the critic must then produce the text himself, thus the term deconstruction.

It is important to remember that Derrida's theory is not one solely related to literature; it is a broader philosophical theory. It was Roland Barthes (originally a structuralist) who began to apply the theory to cultural studies and so literature. The Death of the Author is another hugely important work in deconstruction theory. (See my earlier blog, The Author Problem) If you struggle to get your head around the conceptual basis, there is no need to worry, because in practice it is a lot simpler. Where the New Critics were all about finding unity in the text, deconstruction is about showing up the text's disunity. It is looking to disrupt the binary ideas we take for granted such as male/female good/evil true/false black/white etc. Specifically, it is concerned with the relationship between power and language that exists within these binaries. It highlights those by revealing the flaws, paradoxes and contradictions within the text. The key thing to remember is that it is a political approach concerned with power struggles. To achieve this, we have to read against the grain, or read "the text against itself" as Terry Eagleton in Literary Theory an Introduction tells us, with the goal of "knowing the text as it cannot know itself". Essentially what this means is that you are not reading the text as it is intended, but rather the job of the critic is to try and discover the hidden discourse or textual subconscious that underlies the text (refer back to Introduction). One of the ways in which this could be achieved is unpicking where a word's sound, or root, may refer to other meanings unintended by the author. So for example, the word 'guest' derives from the same word as 'host' which has its root in the Latin hostis, meaning enemy. This is where the term 'hostility' comes from and reveals the double nature of the word 'guest' . This is an example of how a single word can be used to reveal a text's repressed unconscious. Using this method you can then build a psychoanalytical reading or a political reading as you dissect gender, racial, or class relations in its subconscious.  The writer's intention is of no significance, and also, in deconstruction, there is no univocal meaning.

Post-structuralism is very much still an important approach today and even spawned the subject of academics known as cultural studies. Its use does however require a sort of sifting of what is politically useful. Deconstruction played a major role in the emergence of many of the literary theories we will go on to look at later in this blog including feminist theory, Marxist theory, psychoanalytical theory, postcolonial theory and queer theory.