63 famous quotes by the philosopher Jacques Derrida

One of the most prolific representatives of Deconstructivism in the 20th century.

Father of Deconstructivism, Jacques Derrida is surely the most controversial and influential philosopher and writer of the 20th century.. Born in Algeria in 1930, he went into exile in Paris to begin his academic studies.

This author revolutionized all the bases of Western structuralism and grammatical architecture, giving rise to several neologisms and terminologies that would bring him worldwide recognition.

Derrida was also an academic and political activist, opposed to any kind of war and was positioned in favor of human rights (he himself had to go into exile because of his Sephardic Jewish condition) and made resounding appearances against the Vietnam War and the Iraq War of 2003.

Jacques Derrida's phrases for reflection

In this article we are going to guide you on the thought of the Algerian author with some of his most famous phrases.

1. Politics is the dirty game of discrimination between friends and enemies.

This is how the author described his way of seeing politics. He lived in his own flesh this discrimination.

2. Translation itself is writing. It is a productive writing inspired by the original text.

For Derrida, translation was not literal copying into another language, but enriching the original text.

3. We must forget the Manichean logic of truth and lies, and focus on the intentionality of those who lie.

This phrase was a conceptual revolution between the art of lying and the goodness of truth.

4. Increasingly, the uniqueness of the other being questioned is being betrayed.

In this way, he denounced the interpretation and manipulation of people when analyzing their ideas.

5. I have found that frontal criticisms always end up being appropriated by the discourse they are intended to combat.

Sometimes people are that incoherent and cynical, criticizing what we often defend.

6. The method is a technique, a procedure to gain control of the path and make it viable.

Every structure needs guidelines and directives to be followed if it is to be well understood.

7. Every book is a pedagogy destined to form its reader.

Books are not only entertainment, but also a way of learning.

8. The question of architecture is in fact the problem of place, of having a place in space.

Space is limited and architecture is the technique to organize and redistribute it.

9. We know that political space is the space of lies par excellence.

Derrida always saw politics as a relentless tool of manipulation and contrary to truth.

10. Deconstruction is not only the technique of a "disrupted construction", since it conceives the idea of construction as a "construction".

This is how the author defended his terminology, which many misunderstood because of his critical spirit.

11. If the translator neither copies nor restores an original, it is because the original survives and transforms itself.

A reflection on literature.

12. What is relevant in a lie is never its content, but the purpose of the liar.

Jacques always emphasized the final objective of the lie.

13. The lie is not something that is opposed to the truth, but is situated in its purpose.

Once again, with this phrase he justified the use of the lie according to its intentionality.

14. The translation will be in reality a moment of his own growth, he will complete himself in it by growing up.

The technique of translation is not only based on literally copying the original into another language, it is also used to enrich it.

15. What is decisive is the harm it does to the other, without which there is no lie.

Derrida was a thinker and analytic between the relations of the one with the other, and how they are affected.

16. One could say that there is nothing more architectural and at the same time nothing less architectural than deconstruction.

Deconstruction was a controversial and polemical concept.. It was not defined in a single way. It sinned of that which it criticized equally.

17. The establishment of a place that until then had not existed and that is in accordance with what will happen there one day: that is the place.

The place as a phenomenon invented by the hand of man, and consensual at the same time.

18. When the original of a translation claims a complement, it is because it was not originally there without gaps, full, complete, total.

Often the original texts are poorly translated due to their poor linguistic or grammatical expression.

19. The modern political lie no longer hides anything behind itself, but is based on what everyone else is saying

Political lies reflect the lies of fellow citizens.

20. Mass productions do not form readers, but fantastically presuppose an already programmed reader.

With this phrase Jacques Derrida criticized the structure and hierarchization of book publishers as an indoctrinating tool.

21. The path is not a method; this must be made clear

The path to follow is not a method, the technique that follows the path is.

22. Every architectural space, every habitable space, starts from a premise: that the building is on a path.

This is the relationship that Jacques makes between the road and the architectural, as a technique to achieve it.

23. The difficulty of defining the word deconstruction comes from the fact that all the syntactic articulations that seem to lend themselves to such a definition are also deconstructable.

Even the very concept of deconstruction can be easily dismantled and invalidated.

24. There is no building without paths leading to it, nor are there buildings without interior routes, without corridors, stairways, corridors or doors.

Every building has multiple paths, whether for entrance, exit or orientation.

25. Deconstruction is neither an analysis nor a critique, and translation should take this into account.

Derrida insisted on the lack of confrontation that his theory intended, and this is how it was misunderstood by many followers.

26. It is not enough to say that deconstruction cannot be reduced to a mere methodological instrumentality, to a set of rules.

So fuzzy and complex was the very definition of the term deconstruction itself

27. It is also necessary to point out that deconstruction is not even an act or an operation.

This is how Derrida tried to define his deconstructivism, as something abstract.

28. The very instance of crisis (decision, choice, judgment, discernment) is one of the essential objects of deconstruction.

Once again, the author emphasized the critical sense of his thesis.

29. The desire for a new place, for galleries, corridors, for a new way of living, of thinking. It is a promise

The physical place is a set of desires and promises that, until they are not fulfilled, is not effective.

30. Places are places in which desire can recognize itself, in which it can dwell.

As has been said many times, a place is something agreed upon and agreed upon by a given community in order to be able to live together.

31. All deconstruction takes place; it is an event that does not await deliberation, the organization of the subject, or even of modernity....

More than a technique, Derrida referred to deconstruction as a literary event.

32. A community must assume and achieve architectural thinking.

Architecture as a technique of social construction.

33. There is nothing that is present to itself independently of the other in the constitution of the world.

Human interdependence was another of the themes that impassioned the philosopher.

34. I am at war with myself

Derrida was the first to recognize and assume contradictions, and he was often self-critical of himself.

35. I cried when it was time to go back to school soon after I was old enough to be ashamed of such behavior.

Jacques Derrida did not always like going to school and learning.

36. I wrote some bad poetry that I published in North African magazines, but as I withdrew into this reading, I was also led by the life of a kind of young hooligan.

I always maintained an attitude of self-criticism in everything I did, and I recognized it.

37. I dreamed of writing and already models were instructing the dream, a certain language governed by a certain language.

Derrida thus affirmed that all of us, from the moment we begin to dream, are told how we have to do it.

38. Everything is arranged so that it is this way, this is what is called culture.

Culture and values as something imposed, something we must accept in order to survive.

39. If you ask me what I believe in, I don't believe in anything.

He was often diffuse and with ideas that were not very enlightening.

40. I do everything possible or acceptable to escape from this trap.

Jacques was no illusionist. He did nothing that could not be empirically demonstrated or disproved.

41. I never do things just for the sake of complicating them, that would be ridiculous.

I always had an end in mind when analyzing things. Like a path that guides us to a certain place.

42. The problem with the media is that they do not publish things as they are, but mold them to what is politically acceptable.

Jacques was also a detractor of the language used by the media, always adapting it according to their interests.

43. It does not matter how the picture looks. It is the gaze of the other that will give it value.

The interpretation, even of an image, is purely subjective. It all depends on how you look at it.

44. If a work is threatening, it is good, competent and full of conviction.

This is how he emphasized the reaction when one of his works was vetoed and/or strongly criticized.

45. My critics organize a series of obsessive cults with my personality.

Some of Derrida's academic colleagues were more interested in his person than in his works.

46. All discourse, whether poetic or oracular, carries with it a system of rules that define a methodology.

Everything is arranged and predisposed for us to say it in a specific way.

47. I do not believe in the purity of languages.

For this author, languages were a tool of communication, not a symbol of identity.

48. My fiercest opponents believe that I am too visible, too alive and too present in the texts.

Derrida sometimes annoyed his critics by dismantling many of their works.

49. No one gets angry with a mathematician or a physicist whom they do not understand. One only gets angry when they insult him in his own language.

A curiosity that the Algerian author saw and that few of us emphasize.

50. We are all mediators, translators

We always interpret what we are told, what we want to say or what is explained to us.

51. As long as there is a language, generalities will come into play.

This was Jacques' great criticism as a linguist.

52. Who says we are born only once?

He often uttered phrases that went beyond logic.

53. Some authors are offended by me because they fail to recognize their field, their institution.

This is how he explains the behavior of some of his colleagues who criticized him so much.

54. I have always had trouble recognizing myself in institutionalized political language.

Perhaps this is the best time to mention it: Derrida was a politically incorrect man, always escaping from what others expected of him.

55. To this day, I still teach without having passed the physical barrier. My stomach, my eyes and my anxiety all play a part. I haven't left school yet

For Derrida the physical also counts. Apart from being an emotional being, he took the physical part very much into account to explain human behavior.

56. My years at the Ecole Normale were dictatorial. Nothing was left to me to do

He denounces once again how systematic and hierarchical everything is, especially teaching.

57. The boarding school years were a hard period for me. I was always nervous and had all kinds of problems.

He was unfairly treated because he was Jewish and because of his Arab origins.

58. What I cannot see of myself, the Other may see.

The Other is everything else after the self, after our own, and we cannot get rid of it.

59. Whatever I miss in myself, I am able to observe in others.

He was always a humanist philosopher, and he had others as a reference when it came to looking for his shortcomings.

60. We must wait for the Other to come as justice, and if we want to have a chance to negotiate with him, we must do so with justice as our guide.

Jacques Derrida was, above all else, a just and fair man.

61. God does not give the law but only gives a sense of justice.

This is how the author interprets the divine commandments

62. We, who are entrusted with power, must frame ourselves within a responsible justice

Social justice is one of the basic principles for a cohesive society.

63. Philosophy, today, is in grave danger of being forgotten.

A phrase that is still valid.