Derridada: Duchamp as Readymade Deconstruction

111 Pages·2.397 MB·English

by  Thomas Deane Tucker

Derridada

Derridada
Duchamp as Readymade
Deconstruction
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Copyright O 2009 by Lexington Books
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Tucker. Thomas Deane, 1962-
Derridada : Duchamp as readymade for deconstruction /Thomas Deane Tucker.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
1. Duchamp, Marcel, 1887-1968-Criticism and interpretation. 2. Deconstruction.
I. Title
N6853.DgT83 2009
709.2--dc22
ISBN: 978-0-7391-1622-7 (cloth : alk. paper)
ISBN: 978-0-7391-1623-4 (pbk. : alk. paper)
ISBN: 978-0-7391-4584-5 (electronic)
Printed in the United States of America
eN
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American
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Materials, ANSVNISO 239.48-1992.
To my wife, Rana, without whose love and support this book would be
little more than a murmur stranded in my sleep.

Contents
Chapter One A Time for Deconstruction
Chapter Two Ashes to Dust, Dust to Ashes
Chapter Three Indiffdrance
Chapter Four Personas
Notes
Bibliography

Chapter One
A Time for Deconstruction
Given the recent death of Derrida, we should hardly be surprised that
some of his most ardent critics have already tolled the final death knell of
deconstruction. As an academic fashion, deconstruction has been pro-
nounced dead on numerous occasions in the past ten years. Yet, a cursory
glance over the last decade at book titles, chapters, journal articles, and
conference programs may lead one to think that the news of its demise is
perhaps a bit premature. True, compared to its ubiquitous presence in the
1970s and 1980s deconstruction is on the wane, but yet, despite this re-
treat, as an intellectual movement it remains a ghostly presence that con-
tinues to haunt our intellectual landscape.
The difficulty of working through the dense and complex terrain of
Derrida's writing is notorious. An excursion into any of his works means
negotiating the familiar territories of philosophy, literature, and art (to
name but a few) where the signposts have been moved, shattered, or
erased altogether. The reader follows a path through a labyrinth of lan-
guage imbued with puns, wordplay, tropes, neologisms, and often diffi-
cult translations from Greek, Latin, or from German into French or
French into English. It is over this terrain that this book will (lightly)
tread.
Derrida's written work includes essays and books on an intimidating
array of philosophers, writers, poets, and artists who have loomed large
in the discourse of our time and others at the peripheries. He never hid in
the shadow of another thinker's thought if it happened to fall into his