Page 50 - Critical and Cultural Theory

RHETORIC
the Greek word for 'dissimulation' and is indeed the device used to
say something by seeming to say something else. In irony, there-
fore, apparently incompatible ideas coexist: what is affirmed is at
the same time negated, what is declared is simultaneously ques-
tioned. 'Allegory' (from the Greek allegoria = 'speaking other-
1
wise ) is also a figure of dissimulation. It cloaks its meanings with
more or less complex layers of cryptic symbolism and allusions,
thus emphasizing the opacity of signs. Allegory displaces meaning
by speaking otherwise - by stressing that the meanings of its signs
are not inherent in the signs themselves but rather associated with
something other. (The dragons of mediaeval romance are arguably
less meaningful as scaly monsters with fiery breath than as incar-
nations of the alien and the unknown.) 4
The idea that rhetorical figures inhabit a culture's language in
its entirety is often repressed or resisted. Rhetoric is presented as a
game for experts to play, whose linguistic manipulations are quite
separate from the supposedly clear and literal meanings of
ordinary language, so as to further the notion that certain types of
discourse (e.g. non-literary language) are natural and reliable and
that others (e.g. poetic language) are artificial and untrustworthy.
Poststructuralism has radically challenged this view by highlight-
ing the pervasiveness of figures of dissimulation and displacement,
in the belief that these epitomize the general operations of
language.
In the case of Jacques Derrida (b. 1930), the idea that all
language is rhetorical, since all language is marked by the slippage
of meaning, is an important part of his theory of deconstruction. It
seems appropriate, therefore, to examine that idea in relation to
its broader context. For Derrida, as for several other poststructur-
alist theorists, everything is a text. 5 Any set of signs can be
explored and interpreted as an organization of language. To this
extent, Derrida argues, there is nothing outside the text. Texts do
not exist independently of how they are interpreted. Indeed, they
are not immutable objects and do not yield immutable messages.
Rather, they function as pretexts for an incalculably large number
of readings. Most importantly, texts are self-dismantling: they

4 **~ Displacement and association are also examined in Part I, Chapter 2, The
Sign' in the discussion of metaphor and metonymy.
5 t*~ This idea is explored in Part I, Chapter 6, Textuality'.

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