Jacques Derrida
1930-2004 · Postmodernism · Renowned
Derrida was a French philosopher who founded deconstruction, a way of reading that turns a text against itself. Western thought rests on a bias toward what feels present and immediate, he argued, a bias that ranks speech above writing and sameness above difference. Every text carries fissures that undo its own oppositions from within, and he spent a career prying those pairs open.
Signature
The position Derrida is most identified with in the Profiler:
- Meaning
- leans Constructed
- Language
- Différance
Positions on the 5 axes the sources answer
- Identity
- leans Changing (75 on a 0–100 scale from Unchanging to Changing)
- Meaning
- leans Constructed (25 on a 0–100 scale from Constructed to Inherent)
- Nature of Reality
- leans Multiplicity (75 on a 0–100 scale from Unity to Multiplicity)
- Conviction
- leans Uncertain (25 on a 0–100 scale from Uncertain to Certain)
- Allegiance
- leans Global (75 on a 0–100 scale from Local to Global)
15 of 20 axes are left blank: the sources do not answer them, or Derrida refused the framing. Nothing is imputed; a blank is not a middling score.
Foundational questions
- Highest Good
- Justice
What is the highest good? - End of Things
- Open Future
What is the ultimate end of all things? - Ethics Basis
- Relational
What is the ultimate basis of ethics? - Agency
- Social Determinism
What is the nature of human agency and freedom? - Language
- Différance
What is the fundamental nature of language? - Paradox
- Performative
What is the status of paradox?