Post-structuralism

Post-structuralism is a philosophical movement that questions the objectivity or stability of the various interpretive structures that are posited by structuralism and considers them to be constituted by broader systems of power.^[1] Although post-structuralists all present different critiques of structuralism, common themes among them include the rejection of the self-sufficiency of structuralism, as well as an interrogation of the binary oppositions that constitute its structures. Accordingly, post-structuralism discards the idea of interpreting media (or the world) within pre-established, socially constructed structures.^[2][3][4][5]

Structuralism proposes that human culture can be understood by means of a structure that is modeled on language. As a result, there is concrete reality on the one hand, abstract ideas about reality on the other hand, and a "third order" that mediates between the two.^[6]

A post-structuralist critique, then, might suggest that in order to build meaning out of such an interpretation, one must (falsely) assume that the definitions of these signs are both valid and fixed, and that the author employing structuralist theory is somehow above and apart from these structures they are describing so as to be able to wholly appreciate them. The rigidity and tendency to categorize intimations of universal truths found in structuralist thinking is a common target of post-structuralist thought, while also building upon structuralist conceptions of reality mediated by the interrelationship between signs.^[7]

Writers whose works are often characterised as post-structuralist include Roland Barthes, Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault, Gilles Deleuze, and Jean Baudrillard, although many theorists who have been called "post-structuralist" have rejected the label.^[8]

History

Post-structuralism emerged in France during the 1960s as a movement critiquing structuralism. According to J. G. Merquior, a love–hate relationship with structuralism developed among many leading French thinkers in the 1960s.^[4] The period was marked by the rebellion of students and workers against the state in May 1968.

In a 1966 lecture titled "Structure, Sign, and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences", Jacques Derrida presented a thesis on an apparent rupture in intellectual life. Derrida interpreted this event as a "decentering" of the former intellectual cosmos. Instead of progress or divergence from an identified centre, Derrida described this "event" as a kind of "play."

A year later, Roland Barthes published "The Death of the Author", in which he announced a metaphorical event: the "death" of the author as an authentic source of meaning for a given text. Barthes argued that any literary text has multiple meanings and that the author was not the prime source of the work's semantic content. The "Death of the Author," Barthes maintained, was the "Birth of the Reader," as the source of the proliferation of meanings of the text.

Barthes and the need for metalanguage

In Elements of Semiology (1967), Barthes advances the concept of the metalanguage, a systematized way of talking about concepts like meaning and grammar beyond the constraints of a traditional (first-order) language; in a metalanguage, symbols replace words and phrases. Insofar as one metalanguage is required for one explanation of the first-order language, another may be required, so metalanguages may actually replace first-order languages. Barthes exposes how this structuralist system is regressive; orders of language rely upon a metalanguage by which it is explained, and therefore deconstruction itself is in danger of becoming a metalanguage, thus exposing all languages and discourse to scrutiny. Barthes' other works contributed deconstructive theories about texts.

Derrida's lecture at Johns Hopkins

The occasional designation of post-structuralism as a movement can be tied to the fact that mounting criticism of Structuralism became evident at approximately the same time that Structuralism became a topic of interest in universities in the United States. This interest led to a colloquium at Johns Hopkins University in 1966 titled "The Languages of Criticism and the Sciences of Man", to which such French philosophers as Jacques Derrida, Roland Barthes, and Jacques Lacan were invited to speak.

Derrida's lecture at that conference, "Structure, Sign, and Play in the Human Sciences", was one of the earliest to propose some theoretical limitations to Structuralism, and to attempt to theorize on terms that were clearly no longer structuralist.

The element of "play" in the title of Derrida's essay is often erroneously interpreted in a linguistic sense, based on a general tendency towards puns and humour, while social constructionism as developed in the later work of Michel Foucault is said to create play in the sense of strategic agency by laying bare the levers of historical change.

Post-structuralism and structuralism

Structuralism, as an intellectual movement in France in the 1950s and 1960s, studied underlying structures in cultural products (such as texts) and used analytical concepts from linguistics, psychology, anthropology, and other fields to interpret those structures. Structuralism posits the concept of binary opposition, in which frequently-used pairs of opposite-but-related words (concepts) are often arranged in a hierarchy; for example: Enlightenment/Romantic, male/female, speech/writing, rational/emotional, signified/signifier, symbolic/imaginary, and east/west.

Post-structuralism rejects the structuralist notion that the dominant word in a pair is dependent on its subservient counterpart, and instead argues that founding knowledge on either pure experience (phenomenology) or on systematic structures (structuralism) is impossible,^[9] because history and culture actually condition the study of underlying structures, and these are subject to biases and misinterpretations. Gilles Deleuze and others saw this impossibility not as a failure or loss, but rather as a cause for "celebration and liberation."^[10] A post-structuralist approach argues that to understand an object (a text, for example), one must study both the object itself and the systems of knowledge that produced the object.^[11] The uncertain boundaries between structuralism and post-structuralism become further blurred by the fact that scholars rarely label themselves as post-structuralists. Some scholars associated with structuralism, such as Roland Barthes and Michel Foucault, also became noteworthy in post-structuralism.^[12]

Authors

The following are often said to be post-structuralists, or to have had a post-structuralist period:

• Kathy Acker^[13]
• Giorgio Agamben^[14]
• Jean Baudrillard^[15]
• Roland Barthes^[16]
• Wendy Brown^[17]
• Judith Butler^[18]
• Rey Chow^[19]
• Hélène Cixous^[20]
• Jodi Dean^[21]
• Gilles Deleuze^[22]
• Jacques Derrida^[23]
• Umberto Eco^[24]
• John Fiske^[25]
• Michel Foucault^[26]
• Nancy Fraser^[27]
• Félix Guattari^[28]
• Luce Irigaray^[29]
• Julia Kristeva^[30]
• Teresa de Lauretis^[31]
• Sarah Kofman^[32]
• Jacques Lacan^[33]
• Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe^[34]
• Ernesto Laclau^[35]
• Jean-François Lyotard^[36]
• Achille Mbembe^[37]
• Todd May^[38]
• Chantal Mouffe^[39]
• Jean-Luc Nancy^[40]
• Avital Ronell^[41]
• Bernard Stiegler^[42]
• Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak^[43]

Criticism

Some observers from outside of the post-structuralist camp have questioned the rigour and legitimacy of the field. American philosopher John Searle suggested in 1990: "The spread of 'poststructuralist' literary theory is perhaps the best-known example of a silly but non-catastrophic phenomenon."^[44][45] Similarly, physicist Alan Sokal in 1997 criticized "the postmodernist/poststructuralist gibberish that is now hegemonic in some sectors of the American academy."^[46]

Literature scholar Norman Holland in 1992 saw post-structuralism as flawed due to reliance on Saussure's linguistic model, which was seriously challenged by the 1950s and was soon abandoned by linguists:

Saussure's views are not held, so far as I know, by modern linguists, only by literary critics and the occasional philosopher. [Strict adherence to Saussure] has elicited wrong film and literary theory on a grand scale. One can find dozens of books of literary theory bogged down in signifiers and signifieds, but only a handful that refers to Chomsky."^[47]

See also

• Development criticism
• Narrative therapy
• Post-postmodernism
• Post-structural feminism
• Post-structuralist subject
• Reader-response criticism
• Semiotics
• Social criticism
• Social theory

References

1. Lewis, Philip; Descombes, Vincent; Harari, Josue V. (1982). "The Post-Structuralist Condition". Diacritics. 12 (1): 2–24. doi:10.2307/464788. JSTOR 464788.
2. Bensmaïa, Réda (2005). "Poststructuralism". In Kritzman, L. (ed.). The Columbia History of Twentieth-Century French Thought. Columbia University Press. pp. 92–93. ISBN 9780231107907 – via Google Books.
3. Poster, Mark (1988). "Introduction: Theory and the problem of Context". Critical theory and poststructuralism: in search of a context. Cornell University Press. pp. 5–6. ISBN 9780801423369 – via Google Books.
4. Merquior, José G. 1987. Foucault, (Fontana Modern Masters series). University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-06062-8.
5. Craig, Edward, ed. 1998. Routledge Encyclopaedia of Philosophy, vol. 7 (Nihilism to Quantum mechanics). London: Routledge. ISBN 0-415-18712-5. p. 597.
6. Deleuze, Gilles. [2002] 2004. "How Do We Recognize Structuralism?" Pp. 170–92 in Desert Islands and Other Texts 1953–1974, translated by D. Lapoujade, edited by M. Taormina, Semiotext(e) Foreign Agents series. Los Angeles: Semiotext(e). ISBN 1-58435-018-0. pp. 171–73.
7. Harcourt, Bernard E. (12 March 2007). "An Answer to the Question: "What Is Poststructuralism?"". Chicago Unbound - Public Law and Legal Theory. 156: 17–19.
8. Harrison, Paul (2006). "Poststructuralist Theories" (PDF). In Aitken, Stuart; Valentine, Gill (eds.). Approaches to Human Geography. London: SAGE Publications. pp. 122–135. doi:10.4135/9781446215432.n10. ISBN 9780761942634.
9. Colebrook, Claire (2002). Gilles Deleuze. Routledge Critical Thinkers. Routledge. p. 2. ISBN 9781134578023 – via Google Books. Post-structuralism responded to the impossibility of founding knowledge either on pure experience (phenomenology) or systematic structures (structuralism).
10. Colebrook, Claire (2002). Gilles Deleuze. Routledge Critical Thinkers. Routledge. p. 2. ISBN 9781134578023. In Deleuze's case, like many other post-structuralists, this recognised impossibility of organising life into closed structures was not a failure or loss but a cause for celebration and liberation.
11. Raulet, Gerard (1983). "Structuralism and Post-Structuralism: An Interview with Michel Foucault". Telos. 1983 (55): 195–211. doi:10.3817/0383055195. S2CID 144500134.
12. Williams, James (2005). Understanding Poststructuralism. Routledge. doi:10.1017/UPO9781844653683. ISBN 9781844653683.
13. Muth, Katie R. (2011). "Postmodern Fiction as Poststructuralist Theory: Kathy Acker's "Blood and Guts in High School"". Narrative. 19 (1): 86–110. ISSN 1063-3685. JSTOR 41289288.
14. McWhorter, Ladelle (2017), "Post-structuralism and Race: Giorgio Agamben and Michel Foucault", The Routledge Companion to the Philosophy of Race, Routledge, doi:10.4324/9781315884424-9, ISBN 978-1-315-88442-4, retrieved 18 May 2023
15. "V. Postmodern & Poststructuralist Theories | Cultural Politics". culturalpolitics.net. Retrieved 18 May 2023.
16. Translation, International Journal of Linguistics, Literature and (30 January 2021). "A Critical Analysis of the Post-structuralist Thought with Reference to 'The Death of the Author' by Roland Barthes | International Journal of Linguistics, Literature and Translation". International Journal of Linguistics, Literature and Translation. 4 (1): 195–197. doi:10.32996/ijllt.2021.4.1.18.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
17. Relations, E.-International (25 April 2017). "Interview - Wendy Brown". E-International Relations. Retrieved 18 May 2023.
18. Barvosa-Carter, Edwina (1 April 2001). "Strange Tempest: Agency, Poststructuralism, and the Shape of Feminist Politics to Come". International Journal of Sexuality and Gender Studies. 6 (1): 123–137. doi:10.1023/A:1010150325561. ISSN 1573-8167. S2CID 140450434.
19. Pourgouris, Marinos (September 2010). "Rey Chow and the hauntological spectres of poststructuralism". Postcolonial Studies. 13 (3): 275–288. doi:10.1080/13688790.2010.508832. ISSN 1368-8790. S2CID 143221257.
20. Mitrano, Mena, ed. (2022), "Poststructuralism: Faith and Lacan", Literary Critique, Modernism and the Transformation of Theory, Edinburgh University Press, pp. 215–238, ISBN 978-1-3995-1324-1, retrieved 18 May 2023
21. "Repoliticizing the Left: An Interview with Jodi Dean". read.dukeupress.edu. Retrieved 18 May 2023.
22. Williams, James, ed. (2005), "Poststructuralism as philosophy of difference: Gilles Deleuze's Difference and Repetition", Understanding Poststructuralism, Understanding Movements in Modern Thought, Acumen Publishing, pp. 53–78, doi:10.1017/UPO9781844653683.003, ISBN 978-1-84465-032-3, retrieved 18 May 2023
23. "Post-structuralism - Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy". www.rep.routledge.com. Retrieved 18 May 2023.
24. Nöth, Winfried (21 August 2017), "Umberto Eco: Structuralist and Poststructuralist at Once", Umberto Eco in His Own Words, De Gruyter Mouton, pp. 111–118, doi:10.1515/9781501507144-014, ISBN 978-1-5015-0714-4, retrieved 18 May 2023
25. Fiske, John (January 1986). "MTV: Post-Structural Post-Modern". Journal of Communication Inquiry. 10 (1): 74–79. doi:10.1177/019685998601000110. ISSN 0196-8599. S2CID 143414557.
26. Williams, James, ed. (2005), "Poststructuralism, history, genealogy: Michel Foucault's The Archaeology of Knowledge", Understanding Poststructuralism, Understanding Movements in Modern Thought, Acumen Publishing, pp. 105–132, doi:10.1017/UPO9781844653683.005, ISBN 978-1-84465-032-3, retrieved 18 May 2023
27. Kintz, Linda (2003). Hanssen, Beatrice (ed.). "Ethically Challenged: The Impasse between Poststructuralism and Critical Theory". Comparative Literature. 55 (4): 338–349. doi:10.2307/4122573. ISSN 0010-4124. JSTOR 4122573.
28. Arrigo, Adam J. Duso , Bruce A. (2017), "Post-structuralism and criminology", The Routledge Companion to Criminological Theory and Concepts, Routledge, pp. 357–361, doi:10.4324/9781315744902-80, ISBN 978-1-315-74490-2, S2CID 171580517, retrieved 18 May 2023{{citation}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
29. Berg, Maggie (1991). "Luce Irigaray's "Contradictions": Poststructuralism and Feminism". Signs. 17 (1): 50–70. doi:10.1086/494713. ISSN 0097-9740. JSTOR 3174445. S2CID 143878117.
30. Williams, James, ed. (2005), "Poststructuralism, psychoanalysis, linguistics: Julia Kristeva's Revolution in Poetic Language", Understanding Poststructuralism, Understanding Movements in Modern Thought, Acumen Publishing, pp. 133–152, doi:10.1017/UPO9781844653683.006, ISBN 978-1-84465-032-3, retrieved 18 May 2023
31. "Teresa de Lauretis". Oxford Reference. Retrieved 18 May 2023.
32. bloomsbury.com. "Nietzsche and Metaphor". Bloomsbury. Retrieved 18 May 2023.
33. Marta, Jan (1 March 1987). "Lacan and post-Structuralism". The American Journal of Psychoanalysis. 47 (1): 51–57. doi:10.1007/BF01252332. ISSN 1573-6741. PMID 2437811. S2CID 21435280.
34. Fynsk, Christopher (2007). "Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe, 1940–2007". Radical Philosophy (144). ISSN 0300-211X.
35. Jacobs, Thomas (2 October 2018). "The Dislocated Universe of Laclau and Mouffe: An Introduction to Post-Structuralist Discourse Theory". Critical Review. 30 (3–4): 294–315. doi:10.1080/08913811.2018.1565731. hdl:1854/LU-8600661. ISSN 0891-3811. S2CID 150207035.
36. Williams, James (2005), "Poststructuralism as philosophy of the event: Jean-François Lyotard's Discours, figure", Understanding Poststructuralism, Routledge, pp. 79–103, doi:10.4324/9781315712192-4, ISBN 978-1-315-71219-2, retrieved 18 May 2023
37. Weate, Jeremy (2003). "Achille Mbembe and the Postcolony: Going beyond the Text". Research in African Literatures. 34 (4): 27–41. doi:10.2979/RAL.2003.34.4.27. ISSN 0034-5210. JSTOR 4618326. S2CID 145292313.
38. "The Political Philosophy of Poststructuralist Anarchism By Todd May". www.psupress.org. Retrieved 18 May 2023.
39. Leggett, Will (March 2013). "Restoring society to post-structuralist politics: Mouffe, Gramsci and radical democracy". Philosophy & Social Criticism. 39 (3): 299–315. doi:10.1177/0191453712473080. ISSN 0191-4537. S2CID 147566983.
40. Fagan, Madeleine (2013). Ethics and Politics after Poststructuralism: Levinas, Derrida and Nancy. Edinburgh University Press. ISBN 978-0-7486-8513-4. JSTOR 10.3366/j.ctt5hh2xg.
41. admin. "Avital Ronell". The European Graduate School. Retrieved 18 May 2023.
42. Turner, Ben (2 January 2017). "Ideology and Post-structuralism after Bernard Stiegler". Journal of Political Ideologies. 22 (1): 92–110. doi:10.1080/13569317.2016.1253135. ISSN 1356-9317. S2CID 151333183.
43. Mongia, Padmini (1996), "Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak: Poststructuralism, Marginality, Postcoloniality and Value*", Contemporary Postcolonial Theory, Routledge, doi:10.4324/9781003135593-14, ISBN 978-1-003-13559-3, S2CID 234163391, retrieved 18 May 2023
44. Searle, John. (1990). "The Storm Over the University." The New York Review of Books, 6 December 1990.
45. Searle, John (6 December 1990). "The Storm Over the University". The New York Review of Books. New York. ISSN 0028-7504. Retrieved 6 June 2020.
46. Sokal, Alan. 1997. "Professor Latour's Philosophical Mystifications." (Originally published in French in Le Monde, 31 January 1997; translated by the author.)
47. Holland, Norman N. (1992) The Critical I, Columbia University Press, ISBN 0-231-07650-9, p. 140.

Sources

• Angermuller, J. (2015): Why There Is No Poststructuralism in France. The Making of an Intellectual Generation. London: Bloomsbury.
• Angermuller, J. (2014): Poststructuralist Discourse Analysis. Subjectivity in Enunciative Pragmatics. Houndmills, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan
• Barry, P. Beginning theory: an introduction to literary and cultural theory. Manchester University Press, Manchester, 2002.
• Barthes, Roland. Elements of Semiology. New York: Hill and Wang, 1967.
• Cuddon, J. A. Dictionary of Literary Terms & Literary Theory. London: Penguin, 1998.
• Eagleton, T. Literary theory: an introduction Basil Blackwell, Oxford,1983.
• Matthews, E. Twentieth-Century French Philosophy. Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1996.
• Morland, Dave (2004). "Anti-capitalism and poststructuralist anarchism". In Bowen, James; Purkis, Jon (eds.). Changing Anarchism: Anarchist Theory and Practice in a Global Age. Manchester University Press. pp. 23–38. ISBN 0-7190-6694-8.
• Ryan, M. Literary theory: a practical introduction. Blackwell Publishers Inc, Massachusetts,1999.
• Wolfreys, J & Baker, W (eds). Literary theories: a case study in critical performance. Macmillan Press, Hong Kong,1996.

External links

 

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Post-structuralism.

• Structure, Sign, and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences - Jacques Derrida
• Smith, Richard G., ed. (2010). The Baudrillard Dictionary. Edinburgh University Press. ISBN 9780748639229. JSTOR 10.3366/j.ctt1g09vw4.
• Information on Michel Foucault, including an archive of writings and lectures
• - A collaborative website that aims to allow users not only to describe post-structuralist ideas but to create new ideas and concepts based on post-structuralist foundations