Fielding Derrida: Philosophy, Literary Criticism, History, and the Work of Deconstruction (Perspectives in Continental Philosophy)

How to interpret Derrida's work now after so much commentary has been devoted to his thought, and his own astonishing productivity has come to an end? In this groundbreaking collection, Joshua Kates argues that we must begin from a different frame than Derrida himself provides, by inserting his work into already existing fields, by fielding Derrida. Is Derrida a skeptic? Does he subscribe to a death of meaning (and the I) at the hands of a sign? Is his thought at all proximate to contemporary Marxian/post-Marxist thinking? Thanks to placing Derrida's texts in broader fields (such as Husserlian phenomenology and analytic philosophy of language) and subsequently nuancing what such comparisons yield, Kates's work capture Derrida's stances on these and other questions with a new concreteness and an unprecedented scope, forging links to vital debates across the humanities today. Introduction: Fielding Derrida -- Jacques Derrida's Early Writings : Alongside Skepticism, Phenomenology, Analytic Philosophy, And Literary Criticism -- Deconstruction As Skepticism -- Derrida, Husserl, And The Commentators : A Developmental Approach -- A Transcendental Sense Of Death? Derrida And The Philosophy Of Language -- Literary Theory's Languages : The Deconstruction Of Sense Vs. The Deconstruction Of Reference -- Jacques Derrida And The Problem Of Philosophical And Political Modernity -- Jacob Klein And Jacques Derrida : The Problem Of Modernity -- Jacob Klein And Jacques Derrida : Historicism And History In Two Interpretations Of Husserl's Late Writings -- Derrida's Contribution To Phenomenology : A Problem Of No Species? -- Foretellese : Futures Of Derrida And Marx. Joshua Kates. Includes Bibliographical References (p. 217-266) And Index. How are we to interpret Jacques Derridas writings now, after so much commentary has been devoted to his thought and his own astonishing productivity has come to an end? In this groundbreaking book, Joshua Kates extends his earlier contextualizing of Derridas work in relation to Husserl by arguing that we must begin from a frame different from that provided by Derrida himself. His work must be inserted into already existing fields, thus fielding Derrida. By placing Derridas texts in the context of broader fields (such as interpretations of modernity and analytic philosophy of language), Kates captures Derridas stances with a new concreteness and an unprecedented scope, forging links to vital debates across the humanities today.