Some questions deconstructive critics ask about literary texts “. . . the thrilling, returning trains of my youth . . .”:

8 Deconstructive criticism

For many of us who consider ourselves lovers of literature, phrases such as “the random play of signifiers” and “the transcendental signified” evoke the kind of fear and loathing the Crusaders must have felt when they learned that the infidels had taken the Holy City. Although deconstruction is no longer a new phenomenon on the academic scene—the theory was inaugurated by Jacques Derrida in the late 1960s and became a major influence on literary studies dur‑ ing the late 1970s—many students and faculty alike continue to misperceive deconstruction as a superficial analysis of wordplay that destroys our apprecia‑ tion of literature and our ability to interpret it meaningfully. Perhaps one reason deconstruction is frequently misunderstood is that the writing by some of the biggest names in the field—Jacques Derrida, Luce Irigaray, Geoffrey Hartman— as well as the explanations offered by those who attempt to summarize the work of these thinkers, frequently employ such unusual language and organizational principles that they seem to defy our understanding and acceptance. Nevertheless, deconstruction has a good deal to offer us: it can improve our abil‑ ity to think critically and to see more readily the ways in which our experience is determined by ideologies of which we are unaware because they are “built into” our language. And because deconstruction offers these advantages, it can be a very useful tool for Marxism, feminism, and other theories that attempt to make us aware of the oppressive role ideology can play in our lives. In order to under‑ stand how deconstruction reveals the hidden work of ideology in our daily experi‑ ence of ourselves and our world, we must first understand deconstruction’s view of language because, according to Derrida, language is not the reliable tool of com‑ munication we believe it to be, but rather a fluid, ambiguous domain of complex experience in which ideologies program us without our being aware of them.