Keywords structuralism/post-structuralism/deconstruction reading
main body
The ideological wave caused by structuralism and post-structuralism in the 20th century needs no elaboration, let alone a step-by-step introduction. Therefore, this paper mainly outlines their respective influences on cultural theory and cultural research in a comparative way, focusing on the cultural contribution of post-structuralism. As an ideological movement, the influence of post-structuralism is beyond doubt. From literary criticism, cultural studies, political theory, sociology, ethnography, history to psychoanalysis and many other fields, traces of post-structuralism are almost everywhere and still play an important role today. Of course, when discussing post-structuralism, the first problem we encounter is the demarcation between structuralism and post-structuralism.
First, the division between structuralism and post-structuralism.
Undeniably, post-structuralism originates from structuralism, and at the same time, it is a reaction to structuralism to some extent. Perhaps it is for this reason that many scholars think it is difficult to draw a clear line between post-structuralism and structuralism. (Note: Yang, 1998, p. 64. But this gives us some enlightenment: since it is impossible to clearly distinguish post-structuralism from structuralism, it is better to focus on the continuity and opposition between them, so as to clarify their similarities and differences. This approach can not only save a lot of unnecessary arguments, but also give them a clear outline.
Structuralism, in short, originated from the linguistic works of Saussure and Jacobson, and was later developed by Levi-Strauss, becoming a cultural analysis methodology in anthropology. In 1950s, especially in France, its influence not only spread to other social sciences, but also extended to the fields of literary criticism, history and even philosophy through Barthes' narratology and semiotics. It can be said that the 1950s was an era of critical discourse dominated by structuralism, which replaced the position of phenomenology and existentialism in the 1940s. However, in the mid-1950s, some practitioners of structuralist discourse, such as Barthes, began to transcend the inherent limitations of structuralism. In the late 1950s and early 1960s, a new generation of critics appeared, including M Blancho and G Ba Taye. These post-structuralist critics are deeply influenced by Nietzsche, Heidegger and more liberal ideological traditions. Their goal is not limited to dismantling structuralism, but has a broader goal. It was only because structuralism occupied the dominant position at that time that they could only adopt a critical strategy for the time being. In the view of post-structuralists, structuralism is the latest form of western metaphysical tradition, and the criticism of structuralism is the prelude to the criticism of the whole western metaphysical tradition. (Note: Surber, J.P., 1998, P. 19 1. )
From this background, the demarcation between post-structuralism and structuralism often lies in how to understand the "post" of post-structuralism, because this is the focus of many debates. (Note: Edgar, Andrew &; Sedgwick, Peter, (editor. ), 1999, p. 299. If we understand it in the sense of "strength", post-structuralism is a kind of transcendence and substitution for structuralism; If we understand it from the perspective of time series, then post-structuralism develops and expands structuralism in some new directions. From the development of structuralism, it first appeared as the opposite of phenomenology and existentialism, and obviously had the color of anti-humanism in theory, so it clearly opposed the previous "subject-centered" ideological movement. From this point of view, there is obviously continuity between post-structuralism and structuralism, but the latter's theoretical proposition has not gone out of the strange circle of metaphysics, but has restated what it wants to oppose in a new form. Post-structuralism got a very important theoretical inspiration from Saussure's linguistic program, but it did not stop at the basic premise of structuralism, but only dismantled structuralism, and then solved any theory based on "enlightened" concepts of knowledge and truth.
Therefore, the word "post" of post-structuralism can be understood as a comprehensive resignation from all previous theoretical positions of "subject-centered". On the other hand, if structuralism is one of several ideological movements under the background of modernism, then post-structuralism is one of the earliest ideological movements under the background of post-modernism. It can also be said that the division between post-structuralism and structuralism, just like the division between post-modernism and modernism, is different from structuralism in that it is marked by dissolving the metaphysical tradition, although it is difficult to draw a clear line in time.
Second, the sign of post-structuralism: dispelling the metaphysical tradition
To dispel the metaphysical tradition, (note: strictly speaking, it should be "dispelling the central role of metaphysics", because the word "decentre" originally meant "dispelling the center" or "decentralizing", and later it was gradually simplified as "dispelling" in the use of Chinese, but the relationship with "center" could not be seen literally. However, this does not seem to have caused much obstacle to understanding. ) is undoubtedly the most prominent symbol of post-structuralism. However, this is not the initiative of post-structuralism, but a further expansion of the thoughts of German philosophers and cultural critics Nietzsche and Heidegger. In a sense, Nietzsche and Heidegger are the most important historical pioneers of post-structuralism. We might as well look for the ideological source of post-structuralism from Nietzsche and Heidegger.
1. A comprehensive criticism of western civilization
Among modern thinkers, Nietzsche was the first person to criticize the so-called western tradition thoroughly, comprehensively and persistently. In Nietzsche's view, this basic opposition, which was established by Plato's distinction between the unchangeable conceptual world and the changeable emotional world, dominated the process of European thought and history. According to Nietzsche's explanation of Plato, under this distinction, our real world degenerates in comparison with another more perfect world. Then Christianity, which Nietzsche once called "Platonism of the Masses", is essentially based on Plato's opposition, so Christianity should preach the doctrine of atonement in this world and retribution in the afterlife. Although modernity's suspicion of religion weakens the belief in the afterlife, it does not successfully return the meaning or value denied by Platonism and Christianity to the present world. The result is nihilism, that is, a sense of meaninglessness or worthlessness that is common in the whole western civilization; The famous saying "God is dead" was adopted by Tony to appropriately express this nihilistic state.
It is precisely because of the comprehensive study of Nietzsche that Heidegger changed his thinking and turned from phenomenological research to overall criticism. Nietzsche's criticism of western culture is mainly a form of moral criticism, aiming at its religious and political basis, while Heidegger regards the moral nihilism of European culture as a sign of something deeper. In Heidegger's view, when thoughts are forbidden to ask the most important question, that is, the meaning of existence, nihilism is deeply imprinted on the origin of western culture, and its final result is the nihilism of the present world. In this world, science and technology have actually become an independent force, and ultimately dominate all human affairs. However, human beings have lost their sense of meaning or value in the increasingly standardized life. Heidegger believes that the way to transcend this nihilism lies in launching a general criticism of western civilization and thoroughly dismantling its deepest and most basic assumptions, thus clearing the way for establishing a new relationship between existence and human beings. What is needed to achieve this goal is not another philosophy or consciousness, but a newer and truer empirical way of speaking and thinking that is no longer dominated by logic, science and modern technology.
This way of reflection by Heidegger makes later works more and more poetic and even mysterious. In this respect, post-structuralists tend to follow Heidegger on the whole, and are still close to Nietzsche's critical position in many aspects. However, the post-structuralists' acceptance of Nietzsche is mainly manifested in their recognition of Nietzsche's judgment on western culture: western culture is ultimately determined by philosophy, while European philosophy is metaphysical in nature, so any critical project must first shake and dismantle the assumptions and concepts related to western metaphysics as a whole.
2. The will to seek truth and the will to power
Nietzsche found in the search for the driving mechanism of the nihilistic trajectory of western civilization that although western philosophy and its collateral lines are characterized by the pursuit of true will, this is only a more basic and universal principle-the historical variation of the will to power. According to Nietzsche's analysis, the will to power is not only a function of personal desire, but also a metaphysical principle. This principle stipulates everything, starting from the existence of nature, society and even people, so that if everything finally tries to obtain its existence, it must draw its metaphysical sphere of influence. Heidegger believes that Nietzsche's concept of power will is the peak of western metaphysics and the last great metaphysical concept to express the ultimate meaning of western tradition, from which we can get rid of the tyranny of power and meet the dawn of a new relationship between existence and people.
In the view of post-structuralists, Heidegger's explanation of Nietzsche's will to power shows that the ultimate goal of general criticism is to reveal how all cultural discourses, cultural systems and cultural practices are based on specific forms of power and how they are used to support and strengthen these forms. Post-structuralists believe that the issue of power is not only a historical feature or incidental phenomenon of some economic organizations, but also the foundation on which any social organization form and discourse depends, from which we can resist any severe political criticism.
3. The central position of language
If Nietzsche exposed the falsity of western metaphysics with "real illusion", then Heidegger put forward the famous assertion that "language is the home of existence" after reflection. (Note: Sulber, J.P., 1998, P. 188. ) In Heidegger's view, the control of western metaphysics on human experience and thoughts has gradually penetrated into our discourse, so we must find the basis of this control from language. In order to rediscover the meaning of existence, we must first establish a new view of language and a new relationship with language. Obviously, Nietzsche and Heidegger's revelation of metaphysics shows the elimination of language centrality.
Post-structuralism draws lessons from the insights of Nietzsche and Heidegger, and lists discourse and its specific role in different texts as the core of its critical program. They believe that the relationship between discourse and human beings is so close that the operating mechanism in the critical text is equivalent to the critical culture itself. In fact, in the view of post-structuralists, culture is a complex interaction of various discourses. Criticizing culture is to reveal the ways in which various cultural texts show their specific forms of power, and to reveal why texts prefer certain terms, metaphors and rhetoric to suppress other terms, metaphors and rhetoric that are equally important to the meaning of the text. Then, the goal of the so-called thorough criticism is to reveal the "real illusion" caused by cultural texts and the process of preference and suppression in text construction, so that people can realize that the dominant terms and metaphors will be meaningless without these restrictions that they try to cover up and suppress. In other words, if language is a collection of metaphors, and these metaphors become fixed objective terms or real concepts when their origins are forgotten, then the task of thorough criticism is to produce a demystification (disenchantment) effect by revealing their historical, accidental and arbitrary pedigrees, and thoroughly expose their false faces disguised as objective truth.
It should be pointed out that the reason why post-structuralist criticism often has a strange style that seems incomprehensible is obviously directly related to this view of language. Because post-structuralists believe that language is essentially a complex and dynamic interaction between linguistic means and rhetorical means, rather than something that is analyzed as a set of so-called propositions with authenticity. At the same time, from the perspective of post-structuralists' wishes, they try to avoid constructing another kind of "real" or "conceptual" discourse at all costs, because such discourse will make them fall into the trap they want to criticize, so that the expression style of post-structuralism itself becomes a key issue. For post-structuralists, the style of their critical discourse is not a random or whimsical choice, but a critical means to exemplify, refract, reverse or play with the terms of the cultural language they criticize. Therefore, the basic strategy of post-structuralism is not to try to state some real topics about a text, but to make its discourse style instrumental, refractive and deviant, and then teach readers how to criticize the text itself, that is, its purpose is not to try to persuade readers to interpret some real or objective texts. However, the success of this strategy remains a problem.
4. Solution strategy
The western metaphysical tradition reached its peak with Hegel, so we need to take Hegel's philosophical system as the starting point to understand the "decentralization" strategy of post-structuralism, that is, eliminating the center of traditional metaphysics. Hegel's philosophical synthesis of macro and macro is based on three inseparable judgments.
First of all, regarding the development of modern philosophy (the concept of "thinking about self" developed by German idealist philosophers Kant, Fichte and Schelling from Descartes), Hegel thinks that the highest state of western tradition is the ultimate realization of self-consciousness, that is, subjective consciousness is the source of all reality, truth and existence. In Hegel's view, although Socrates' famous saying "Know yourself" established the basic agenda for western philosophy, Socrates' exhortation was finally realized only in post-Christianity, that is, in the modern world. Therefore, Hegel established the central position of consciousness or subjectivity in the most extreme form, believing that consciousness or subjectivity is the center of all truth and existence, and is the irrefutable ultimate court, which is responsible for ruling all judgments about truth, meaning and human value. In Hegel's view, all existence can't refuse to be included in the absolute and closed cycle represented by self-consciousness: the subject of self-consciousness has no "O external" and "Other" (Note: Surber, J.P., 1998, P. 188).
Secondly, closely connected with these thoughts is Hegel's view of culture, especially his view that philosophy is the highest embodiment of culture. In Hegel's view, the real achievement that western civilization can last forever is the thought and system put forward by such a great philosopher as Hegel, because every philosopher expressed the highest form of pure rational thought of his time. In other words, every philosopher embodies the highest level of self-awareness or subjectivity that can be achieved in his time. Hegel's explanation of culture and history is rooted in the fact that all cultural texts are ultimately philosophical, so they are all reasonable, because they embody the "truth" most clearly expressed by philosophy of that era. Hegel believes that treating a text as reasonable means that it is an organic unity with internal coherence, and it expresses the only dominant idea that runs through all texts. In other words, according to the interpretation of Hegel's philosophical paradigm, the text should be regarded as a completely clear intermediary, which directly conveys the author's reasonable and unified thoughts to readers without distortion. For an interpreter who is conscious in philosophy, he should be able to grasp the concept of giving life and unity to the text. The specific content or style of the text has nothing to do with its philosophical significance and meaning. The latter can only be coherent, unified and reasonable. Therefore, Hegel thinks that the text is reasonable, unified and centralized, which is completely corresponding to his view that the subject of self-consciousness is the ultimate source of all texts.
Finally, Hegel's point of view means that history can never be regarded as just an accidental arrangement of empirical events or a variety of traditional complex textures. In Hegel's view, history is a unified, inevitable and reasonable development of contemporary philosophy in the process of the development of subject's self-consciousness. The history of philosophy constitutes the real essence and paradigm of history itself, so the real history can only be rational and reasonable. In fact, Hegel went further, thinking that history is a universal "world spirit" that transcends individuals to realize self-consciousness, and it is a unique, unified and consistent narrative of doomed progress. This view of history, in a famous saying of Hegel, is "what is realistic is reasonable, and what is reasonable is realistic"; Then explaining historical texts is to determine their specific role in the development of self-consciousness leading teleology.
Although several generations of thinkers after Hegel have abandoned Hegel's philosophy, the basic concepts on which Hegel's philosophy is based still have influence. In the broadest sense, post-structuralists try to eliminate these remnants of western metaphysics once and for all, and their critical strategies aim at eliminating the core concepts of metaphysics.
So Lacan dispelled the subject, Derrida dispelled the text and Foucault dispelled the history. Although they have their own emphases and adopted different critical discourses, their digestion strategies are interactive, and it is easy to misunderstand to draw a clear line between the two viewpoints. However, no matter who is a post-structuralist, we must first transcend the binary opposition of structuralism before we can solve it. In other words, the resolution strategy of post-structuralism is based on the binary opposition of structuralism to some extent.
Third, transcend binary opposition.
The emergence of post-structuralism is based on structuralism. In a sense, post-structuralism is to implement its own resolution strategy in the process of transcending the binary opposition of structuralism. Therefore, deconstruction is not an empty theoretical hypothesis, but a concrete theoretical achievement. As we all know, a basic concept of structuralism is that a boundary can be clearly drawn between the surface structure and the deep structure of a text or phenomenon. In the view of post-structuralism, this distinction is only a reaffirmation of the traditional metaphysical distinction between generation and existence, opinion and truth, expression and reality, and phenomenon and noumenon. In every pair, the former is always light before the latter. Post-structuralism holds that the former and the latter are completely interdependent in each pair, so the distinction between the surface structure and the deep structure is hypothetical, the product of the game of meaning or signification, not the realistic or ultimate distinction. Not only the deep structure should control the surface structure, but also it should express itself on the surface structure, and the surface structure often has to resist, break or even abandon the so-called logic of the deep structure. More specifically, in the view of post-structuralists, the meaning of any text should not be found in the deep structure behind or at the bottom, but in the meaning game in which the elements of the text are constantly changing.
In this way, post-structuralism takes a series of binary opposites of structural concepts as a breakthrough, and then reveals that binary opposites are given to objects by people, not the objects themselves. This is a well-conceived structure, an artificial game. However, does this breakthrough have real epistemological significance, or has it entered a more extreme subjectivism? Perhaps the transcendence of post-structuralism over binary opposition is a remedy to a greater extent, that is, when the concept of structure is stretched everywhere, post-structuralism introduces people into a text world farther away from the natural world with a more confusing meaning game. We can see the break between structuralism and post-structuralism, and the continuation between them. It is worth noting that the break may be an illusion, or it may cover up a transformation or continuation. From the so-called transcendence of post-structuralism over the binary opposition of structuralism, it is not difficult to see that this transcendence is more of a change in thinking mode or a change in playing style.
1. The relationship between signifier and signified
A basic principle of structuralism comes from Saussure's definition of symbols. Saussure defined symbol as the relationship between signifier and signified, and the latter was regarded as a psychological concept. He thinks this relationship is arbitrary because there is no natural relationship at all. However, once the relationship between signifier and signified is determined, the resulting symbols are often regarded as relatively stable units in the language system. Post-structuralists obviously cannot agree with this stable and static structure. So they put the word "sliding" before the signifier and the signified to show their difference from structuralism. The concepts of "variable signifier" and "variable signified" are nothing more than transforming a static concept into a dynamic concept. In the view of post-structuralists, in the actual use of language, the relationship between signifier and signified is always changing and changing, so the same signifier can undergo various changes in different contexts or different historical periods according to its related signified. Post-structuralism takes the literary application of language, especially the poetic style and rhetorical devices, as an example, emphasizing the creativity and uncertainty of meaning, which is in sharp contrast with the rigid structure of structuralism. In particular, they point out that metaphor and metonymy can better reflect the actual nature of language than structuralism. From the perspective of post-structuralism, the language structure described by structuralism, as Nietzsche said, is only the remnants of metaphors and other metaphors, which have lost the luster of his poems through constant repetition and circulation. (Note: Sulber, J.P., 1998, P. 192. Well, post-structuralists obviously want to return poetry to language, because "language itself is poetry" (Heidegger's language). This kind of poem is the real meaning. It is as ever-changing as Proteus, and a stable language structure cannot capture such quality.
2. Language and speech and closed questions
Post-structuralists follow the same ideological line and refuse structuralism's strict distinction between language and speech. The meaning of changeable signifier and changeable signified in post-structuralism is that the meaning possibility of a language system cannot be divorced from the actual use of language, because in the actual occurrence of language activities, a new and creative relationship is always forged between signifier and signified, and the language system itself is always in an unstable state. Then, language can never be a fixed, given and closed meaning possibility matrix, from which actual speech activities can choose. At best, it can only be regarded as a historical file of language innovation. Some meaningful possibilities are constantly being abandoned, while others are constantly being increased.
Post-structuralism especially criticizes structuralism's assumption that the language system or the text it produces is closed, and thinks that this assumption is the residue of metaphysical thinking mode. In this regard, post-structuralism puts forward a completely opposite view that language and text are completely open and vague. In other words, language and text can convey multiple meanings and accept multiple interpretations. Therefore, language and writing are open spaces for meaningful games.
3.*** Time and duration
Although structuralism regards * * * temporality and diachronic as binary opposites, its analysis obviously pays more attention to the former, that is, the * * * dimension of language, text or culture, and pays less attention to its historicity, that is, diachronic development. Post-structuralism has no intention to recount diachronic history, but its focus is to point out the artificiality and inadequacy of diachronic and diachronic distinction. Obviously, a "time period" is separated from a dynamic time process, just as any dynamic process can be fixed at a certain point, thus producing a time profile for analysis. Process and profile are always two sides of the same phenomenon. But in the view of post-structuralists, the more crucial point is that just as the system structure sought by structuralist * * * time analysis is actually an illusion produced by suppressing the meaning game, the obvious time continuity produced by diachronic analysis is also an artificial effect of effective hypothesis. Not only are languages and their texts open and polysemy, but the history of their emergence, acceptance and mutual influence cannot be outlined according to some continuous or uninterrupted arc. Post-structuralists intend to point out that over time, different language products and texts interact, borrow and comment on each other in a rather arbitrary and unpredictable way, and often weaken each other's superficial meaning. For this reason, post-structuralism sometimes uses the word "intertextuality" to arouse people's attention to text games played over time. In this way, post-structuralism rejects any idea about the all-inclusive historical development process and allows different texts to influence and confront each other.
4. Writing is a vertical aggregation relationship.
As the founder of structuralism, Saussure obviously pays more attention to spoken language than written language, so "speaking" is in a privileged position and "writing" is in a secondary position. In his view, writing is just a kind of "symbol" (note: Surber, J.P., 1998, P. 193. ), a secondary auxiliary tool for coding spoken language, has no real linguistic significance in itself. Therefore, writing has never been an important theme in the program of structuralism, and then structuralism keenly grasped this defect and thought that the suppression of writing was a typical feature of the western metaphysical tradition followed by structuralism. As a result, post-structuralists do the opposite, reversing the importance of spoken and written language. First of all, post-structuralists believe that attaching importance to oral language is better than written language, or reviving oral language is better than dictation, which naturally leads structuralism to infer some ultimate source of structure from the perspective of mind or its conceptual thinking process. For example, Levi-Strauss once thought that the structure he studied was a fixed feature of human psychology or culture (Note: Surber, J.P., 1998, P. 193. ), and then whether structuralism should be abandoned is precisely the essentialist's point of view. Secondly, the view that speaking, rather than writing, is the expression of vertical cohesion in language often intensifies structuralism's theoretical blindness to meaning games and polysemy, because this invisibly encourages the view that, in principle, the meaning of any statement can be clarified and confirmed by further questioning the speaker. Of course, this situation is unlikely to happen in written texts, but in structuralism, the concept of the speaker's presence that determines the meaning naturally extends to the concept of writing. Therefore, structuralism often understands the text as the language system itself and a closed and unified whole, which has a definite meaning corresponding to the author's intention when constructing the text.
In the view of post-structuralism, writing provides a more sufficient aggregate relationship for understanding the actual function of language. In the most basic sense, writing itself presents a series of visible symbol combinations on the surface, which are separated by different spacing and punctuation marks, while the writer, the maker of these symbols, is often absent and cannot be clarified. It is the materiality of writing that shows the essence of its artificial conception and the game between the "existence" of the mark and the "absence" of the distance. In other words, writing is not a closed whole, but a polysemous composition with many "open" points from which interpretation can enter and exit. As an "authority" in his own writing, the author's absence just shows the importance of reader activities. In the process of reading, readers not only pay attention to the meaning the author wants to express, that is, the meaning determined according to the structural possibility chosen by the author in a language, but also decode, recode and play the written text in the reader's own interpretation context.
It can be seen that the so-called transcendence of binary opposition is nothing more than a change from a linguistic and scientific world to a textual and explanatory world, and nothing more than a change from structure, logic and method to deconstruction, explanation and game. Can this breakthrough completely destroy the metaphysical tradition?
In fact, both Lacan's interpretation of Freud, Derrida's deconstruction strategy, and Foucault's archaeology and genealogy have repeatedly impacted the western metaphysical tradition, but they can only say that what they have accomplished is the expansion of cognitive perspective, which is not enough to subvert the foundation of western metaphysics, because post-structuralism itself is just a kind of "subjectivism without subject". (Note: Anderson, p. 1983, p.54) In short, it is not enough to form an epistemological revolution just by making a sound in condemning positivism.
Of course, post-structuralism is not a simple language game cycle, and its deconstruction has indeed had an immeasurable impact on cultural analysis and cultural criticism.
Fourthly, between method and anti-method: the mystery of deconstruction and its social and cultural critical significance.
Just as the concept of structure has caused a strong buzz in western academic circles, the concept of deconstruction has also caused great repercussions. Just as British and American anthropologists flocked to structural methods, structural analysis once penetrated into almost all anthropological studies, and deconstruction was also very popular in the 1970s and 1980s, especially under the promotion and popularization of Yale School in the United States, which expanded from the field of literary criticism to the whole field of cultural studies. This shows that deconstruction is not Derrida's own patent, nor is it a "game" he plays alone. Deconstruction has become a "trend of thought" because it has entered the political, cultural and social fields. Deconstruction is no longer a simple deconstruction, but a deconstruction.