Literary Criticism: A look Into Deconstruction

A Little Literary Humor!

What is Deconstruction?

• It is a radical approach to reading.

• This literary criticism is not fully developed.

• The founder of deconstruction is Jacques Derrida

• Explained as a strategy “Rules for reading, interpretation and writing.”

History of Deconstruction

• Rene Descartes (1596-1650) and Fredrick Nietzsche (1844-1900) were pioneers in deconstruction.

• They began to question the objective truth of language.

• This is also known as Poststructuralist, this criticism came after structuralism.

Structuralism

• This is the prelude to Deconstruction.

• It is a science that seeks to understand how a system works, In this case, Language.

• The structure of language comes from the human mind.

Ferdinand de Saussure

• Looked at language Diachronically.

• He traced words over time looking for the changes in sounds and meanings.

Rules of Language

• These rules of language were developed by Ferdinand de Saussure.

• Langue - Language is made of a set of rules, known as this.

• Parole - General rules of language applied by members of a specific community.

• Signs – He depicted language as a set of signs, that came in two parts the Signifier and the Signified

Signified and Signifier in Deconstruction

• Signifier – The written and sound construction that makes up a word

• Signified – The meaning of the word.

• Deconstruction looks at the ambiguities in signifiers, and states that there can be many different signified meanings for a single signifier

Binary Oppositions

The most important part of Deconstruction.

This literary criticism uses Binary Oppositions to look at what is not in a story.

Of the two parts of binary oppositions, There is a dominant and a oppressed or non-dominant.

Others Involved

Roland Barthes(1915-1980) – French Theorist whom worked on the development of structuralism and Deconstruction.

Vladamir Propp(1895-1970) – Russian scholar that worked on folk tales.

Jonathan Culler(1944-Today) – Worked at Cornell University; Worked on Structuralism.

Impact of Deconstruction

Takes away from the text because you are looking for what's not there.

Makes literature seem like “Word Play”(Dobie)

Humanists view it as a “wedge between life and literature”(Dobie)

Looks for the Ideologies that are in our language.

Deconstruction In Practice

In deconstruction the signified and the signifier are unstable, and can take on multiple meanings.

We live in a logo centric world – We want to believe that everything is grounded.

In Deconstruction, this is the opposite of the logo centric view.

Deconstructive Analysis

In a Deconstructive analysis you are looking to reverse the dominant and non-dominant binary oppositions.

Giving the privileged status to the oppressed of the two Binary opposites.

Tries to find blind spots in the literature. Derrida derived this method because “By

deconstructing constraints, he tried to open new ways of thinking and knowing”(Dobie)

Poem Deconstruction – Snow

• Look at Symbolism of snow to extract the opposite:

• White• Cold• Winter

• Usually symbolizing death so the opposite could be life.

• This poem then could be talking about the Rebirth of humans in religion.

Snow

By Frederick Seidel

Snow is what it does.It falls and it stays and it goes.It melts and it is here somewhere.We all will get there.

Source: Poetry (September 2012).

Poem Deconstruction – Six Lines for Louise Bogan

This poem almost deconstructs itself.

Notice that there are 2 parts to each sentence, making 4 in each line.

This poem tells of each opposite in itself. Tamed Love Wildness Beloved

Six Lines for Louise Bogan

By Michael Collier

All that has tamed me I have learned to love and lost that wildness that was once beloved.

All that was loved I’ve learned to tame and lost the beloved that once was wild.

All that is wild is tamed by love— and the beloved (wildness) that once was loved.

Source: Poetry (April 2012).

Credits and Citations

Dobie, Ann B. Theory into Practice. Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, 2012. Paperback.

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