Page 51 - Critical and Cultural Theory

LANGUAGE AND INTERPRETATION
invariably contain gaps, inconsistencies and uncertainties (aporias)
that cause them to fall or fail by their own criteria. This is the
principal bearing of'deconstruction'. This term is often used inac-
curately (sadly by academics themselves) to describe the act of
pulling a text apart. In fact, deconstruction is primarily about
showing how texts question themselves: how even the apparently
most coherent arguments are punctured by incongruities.
Derrida's deconstructionist project challenges many conven-
tional assumptions embedded in Western thought. It undermines
the humanist notion that identity is a natural and unitary endow-
ment and advocates instead the idea of a plural and culturally
constructed subject. 6 It questions the principle of mimesis (accord-
ing to which texts are capable of faithfully reflecting reality) by
stressing that reality is always an effect of how it is represented,
interpreted and distorted. When we think we are looking at a
faithful reflection of reality, we are actually dealing with an inter-
pretation - more or less biased - of reality. Hence, 'we need to
interpret interpretations more than to interpret things' (Derrida
1978: 278). It is in the field of historiography that reality is most
blatantly distorted and yet presented as an objective chain of facts.
Derrida believes that the idea of history is quite different from
actual events and processes. This is because real occurrences are
shaped, in their recording, by dominant systems of values that
foreground certain elements and marginalize or repress others. We
should therefore realize that 'there is not one single history .. but
.
rather histories' (Derrida 1981: 58).
In arguing that everything is a text, that texts are self-disman-
tling, and that approaches to identity, reality and history leave
much unsaid, deconstruction points to the idea that rhetoric
pervades language and the cultural structures based upon it.
Western philosophy and criticism have been keen on distinguish-
ing between dependable forms of language, supposed to give us
truths unimpaired by rhetorical tricks, and fictional forms,
supposed to be dubious due to their reliance on rhetorical devices.
However, all texts have a figurative dimension, insofar as all texts
are based on the displacement of meaning and presence: 'no
element can function as a sign without relating to another element

6
1*" This theme is examined in detail in Part II, Chapter 2, 'Subjectivity'
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