Deconstruction

CORE DEFINITION

In Continental philosophy and literary criticism, deconstruction (French: déconstruction; English: deconstruction) is a school of criticism founded by the French post-structuralist philosopher Jacques Derrida. Derrida proposed a method he called deconstruction for reading Western philosophy. Broadly speaking, deconstructive reading shows that a text cannot be interpreted merely as a single author conveying an obvious message, but rather as an embodiment of various conflicts within a certain culture or worldview. A deconstructed text reveals many simultaneous viewpoints that often conflict with each other. Comparing a deconstructive reading with a traditional reading also shows that many of these viewpoints are suppressed and ignored. The deconstructionist school complements structuralism; deconstructionism holds that structure has no center, is not fixed, and is unstable. Therefore, deconstructionism is also called post-structuralism. Derrida believed that texts have no fixed meaning, and that an ultimate, unchanging meaning of a work does not exist.