Comments on the role of language and text in Derrida and Foucault:
In my opinion Derrida is both a critique and extension of certain
notions development with the field of the linguistic science- semiotics,
which relies upon the notion of the sign and signifier. In the Order of
Things Foucault traces the epistemic breaks with in the sciences of
language- renaissance, classical and modern. Language during the
renaissance was consistuted primarily as ?the language of being? and
pre-science in which the ?words? characterized the essence or
ontological being of the objects or things they named. The Renaissance
episteme?s came to language as an attempt to recover the Gods original
language before the fall of Babel.
Classical:
the configuration of knowledge which Foucault terms the
classical episteme there came about a shift in which language or words
served as an arbitrary function which on the one had reduced itself to
mere description and tool which made a whole range of cataloging
techniques possible, while on the other hand exhibited itself in a
general grammar and etymological histories. It was concerned with pure
rules of grammar which served the task of language?s classification into
certain families. The history of language in terms a cataloging of
certain families. And the tracing of certain
words reaching back into the Sanskrit. More of less with the
Enlightenment thinkers in general, who adopted the
methodology set upon achieving empirical Truth, rejecting the
renaissance notion of language as ?divination? and championed a notion
of language as descriptive tool, language became something that is
?useful? in describing a world of ?proven facts? to which it no inherent
ontological relation.
But I am losing my train of thought , Oh yes what I wanted to say in
this that linguistics in the or language grammar and the current and
past science that have come to be called more or less linguistic today
serve and integral function in the modern configuration of knowledge. In
fact it along witheconomics, and biology are the formers or constructors
of ?man? in the modern episteme. The Order of Things addresses semiotics
as well but in an entirely different fashion than Derrida, I the sense
that Foucault does not give language in privileged potion among the
sciences of ?man? in the modern episteme, but rather speaks of the
danger of a return to language. If we take the arguments put forward in
the Order of Things seriously the striving toward a post ?man? , post
?modern configuration of knowledge? or post ?modern episteme? is a total
rejection of the sciences which posit ?man;? linguistic being one of
them. Rather than raise to the status of semiotics? critique to a new
delayed, and deferred and self canceling play of being, Foucault
dismisses language as yet another science of ?man?. But this is a solely
archeological approach to language which was given off, for genealogy. I
somebody could try and relate how genealogy could be used in a critique
of Derrida.
Jeremiah
In my opinion Derrida is both a critique and extension of certain
notions development with the field of the linguistic science- semiotics,
which relies upon the notion of the sign and signifier. In the Order of
Things Foucault traces the epistemic breaks with in the sciences of
language- renaissance, classical and modern. Language during the
renaissance was consistuted primarily as ?the language of being? and
pre-science in which the ?words? characterized the essence or
ontological being of the objects or things they named. The Renaissance
episteme?s came to language as an attempt to recover the Gods original
language before the fall of Babel.
Classical:
the configuration of knowledge which Foucault terms the
classical episteme there came about a shift in which language or words
served as an arbitrary function which on the one had reduced itself to
mere description and tool which made a whole range of cataloging
techniques possible, while on the other hand exhibited itself in a
general grammar and etymological histories. It was concerned with pure
rules of grammar which served the task of language?s classification into
certain families. The history of language in terms a cataloging of
certain families. And the tracing of certain
words reaching back into the Sanskrit. More of less with the
Enlightenment thinkers in general, who adopted the
methodology set upon achieving empirical Truth, rejecting the
renaissance notion of language as ?divination? and championed a notion
of language as descriptive tool, language became something that is
?useful? in describing a world of ?proven facts? to which it no inherent
ontological relation.
But I am losing my train of thought , Oh yes what I wanted to say in
this that linguistics in the or language grammar and the current and
past science that have come to be called more or less linguistic today
serve and integral function in the modern configuration of knowledge. In
fact it along witheconomics, and biology are the formers or constructors
of ?man? in the modern episteme. The Order of Things addresses semiotics
as well but in an entirely different fashion than Derrida, I the sense
that Foucault does not give language in privileged potion among the
sciences of ?man? in the modern episteme, but rather speaks of the
danger of a return to language. If we take the arguments put forward in
the Order of Things seriously the striving toward a post ?man? , post
?modern configuration of knowledge? or post ?modern episteme? is a total
rejection of the sciences which posit ?man;? linguistic being one of
them. Rather than raise to the status of semiotics? critique to a new
delayed, and deferred and self canceling play of being, Foucault
dismisses language as yet another science of ?man?. But this is a solely
archeological approach to language which was given off, for genealogy. I
somebody could try and relate how genealogy could be used in a critique
of Derrida.
Jeremiah