Abstract
In Speech and Phenomena and other works, Derrida criticizes Husserl’s phenomenology and attempts to pave the way to his deconstructive philosophy. The starting point of his criticism of Husserl’s phenomenology is his assessment of the latter’s phenomenology of language developed in the Logical Investigations. Derrida claims that Husserl’s phenomenology of language in the Logical Investigations and the subsequent works is guided by the premise of the metaphysics of presence. The aim of this paper is twofold: on the one hand, it aims to show that Derrida’s criticism of Husserl’s phenomenology of language is off the mark and, on the other hand, it aims to reveal that the phenomenology of language goes far beyond the scope of the Derridian deconstructive philosophy of language.
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Notes
Derrida (1973). In this paper, this work will be referred to with the abbreviation SP.
Husserl (1970). In this paper, this work will be referred to with the abbreviation LI. Under circumstances, I have made a slight modification of the English translation. Husserl’s works published in Husserliana will be referred to with the abbreviation Hua.
In this context, Derrida writes as follows: “Indication must be set aside, abstracted, and ‘reduced’ as an extrinsic and empirical phenomenon, even if it is closely related to expression, empirically interwoven with expression. But such a reduction is difficult. It is only apparently accomplished at the end of the third paragraph. Indicative functions, sometimes of another kind, continually reappear further on, and getting rid of them will be an infinite task. Husserl’s whole enterprise—and far beyond the Investigations—would be threatened if the Verflechtung which couples the indicative sign to expression were absolutely irreducible, if it were in principle inextricable and if indication were essentially internal to the movement of expression rather than being only conjoined to it, however tenaciously” (SP, p. 27); “Communication itself is for Husserl a stratum extrinsic to expression. But each time an expression is in fact produced, it communicates, even if it is not exhausted in that communicative role, or even if this role is simply associated with it. We will have to clarify the modalities of this interweaving” (SP, p. 20).
In this context, Derrida writes in Speech and Phenomena as follows: “From the start of the analysis the concern to bring out what it is that assures the properly logical function of speech is manifest. We find that the essence or telos of language is determined as logical and that, as in the Investigations, the theory of speech reduces the considerable mass of what is not purely logical in language to extrinsic value” (SP, p. 111). Another passage reads as follows: “Although spoken language is a highly complex structure, always containing in fact an indicative stratum, which, as we shall see, is difficult to confine within its limits, Husserl has nonetheless reserved for it the power of expression exclusively—and thereby pure logicality” (SP, p. 18) .
As will be discussed below, this mundane phenomenology could be changed into a transcendental phenomenology through the change of the natural attitude into the transcendental attitude.
As will be discussed in the next section, the other kind of the phenomenology of language that is developed in the Logical Investigations is the static phenomenology of language.
As mentioned above in Sect. 2, the phenomenology developed in the Logical Investigations is a mundane phenomenology. It should be noted that mundane phenomenology could be changed into transcendental phenomenology through the change of attitude from the natural to the transcendental. It is in this sense that one of the two kinds of phenomenology of language developed in the Logical Investigations could be considered to be static phenomenology of language still as a kind of transcendental phenomenology.
The German original text reads as follows: “Das Ineinander der Konstitution, und somit das intentionale Inexistieren in der Erkenntnis, ist Miteinander des Seins und ist das Fundament fuer ein neues Ineinander, das der Vergemeinschaftung[…].”.
What matters here is the manuscript from July 1935 that has the title “Das Kind. Die erste Einfühlung” and was published as Appendix XLV of Hua XV, p. 604 ff.
References
Derrida, Jacques. 1973. Speech and phenomena. In Speech and phenomena and other essays on Husserl’s Theory of Signs. (trans. Allison, D.B.). Evanston: Northwestern University Press.
Husserl, Edmund. 1963. Cartesianische Meditationen und Pariser Vorträge. (ed. Strasser, S.). Den Haag: Martinus Nijhoff. (Hua I).
Husserl, Edmund. 1970. Logical investigations. (trans. Findlay J.N.). London: Routledge.
Husserl, Edmund. 1973. Zur Phänomenologie der Intersubjektivität. Texte aus dem Nachlaß. (ed. Kern. I.). Den Haag: Martinus Nijhoff. (Hua XV).
Husserl, Edmund. 1976. Ideen zu einer reinen Phänomenologie und phänomenologischen Philosophie. Zweites Buch: Phänomenologische Untersuchungen zur Konstitution. (ed. Biemel, M.). Den Haag: Martinus Nijhoff. (Hua IV).
Husserl, Edmund. 1999. Cartesian meditations. An introduction to phenomenology. (trans. Cairns, D.). Dordrecht/Boston/London: Kluwer.
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Acknowledgments
This paper was presented at the “Symposium for Intercultural Phenomenology on Language,” Kyoto, Japan, February 21, 2009. I thank Professor Toru Tani, Professor Shinji Hamauzu and Professor Tetsuya Sakakibara for their kind invitation to the symposium. I would like to express my gratitude to Dr. Kyeong-Seop Choi for his kind help with the English text.
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Lee, NI. Phenomenology of language beyond the deconstructive philosophy of language. Cont Philos Rev 42, 465–481 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11007-009-9118-9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11007-009-9118-9