Re: The real problem...

Nah....see below...

Yocum Daniel GS 21 CES/CEOE wrote:

>That is the point John, we read his older texts first and they seem
>to mean one thing and in later texts he says that what many have understood
>the texts to mean was not what it meant but does not the meaning reside in
>the text?
>
If you're saying Derrida changed his position over time, fine, but it'd
be nice if you provided quotations. What John seemed to be arguing was
that Derrida's understanding of "deconstruction" was stable from the
time of writing to the time of comment. If you disagree, well, that's
simply a disagreement over facts, so you should support your assertions
with some facts. John provided quotations to support his ideas, you
should too.

>So when Derrida later clarifies the meaning he is not changing
>the meaning in that older text since it already exists apart from him but
>rather what we get from him is his intended meaning which is not relevant to
>those readers extracting meaning from the older text yet it is relevant for
>those who want to know what the author means.
>
The issue, as I see it, has never been what Derrida's _texts_ "mean" --
as you and Luke have framed it -- but what Derrida himself _means_ and
stands for. You don't see a difference because you probably equate
textual meaning with authorial intent. If you want to know what Derrida
thinks, you need to read his writing and then his comments about his
writing and figure it out from there, especially if there are repeated
comments all about one point (such as the meaning of "deconstruction" --
this is a rare instance in which an author has commented extensively on
his own work). It's perfectly legitimate to claim that Derrida's later
stated intention isn't consistent with what he actually wrote, but to
support this claim you should cite his texts and then his later
interpretation of it and show us how the two conflict.

 From what I've read of the earlier work and his later comments, the two
don't seem to conflict at all.

Jim

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Received on Thu Aug 14 13:40:31 2003