>Few things. First, sorry if I seemed cranky earlier. No explanations--just
>sometimes my email demeanor isn't what I'd like.
Neither is mine. Anyway, no explanations necessary. And, if appropriate, apologies in advance.
I'd said:
>> 1) I am a trace - I am never really present because I, my environment and
>> my utterances are as much an infinite mess of absences as apparent
>> presences. My intention is not really present to me, either, so I must
>> take care not be clear because to appear to be clear is to perpetrate the
>> logo/phallocentric myths that only a very limited scope of meanings is
>> present in the social enunciation of a statement and/or that the sign
>> might represent a referent and/or that I know what I mean when I think I'm
>> meaning to say it.
Which led you to ask:
>Where does Derrida say that subjects are traces?
What about Margins of Philosophy (look up 'intention')? Derrida dissolves the subject such that 'it' can never know its speech acts (bit of Austin there) are locutionary or perlocutionary. Me, I don't reckon it matters. We go (for go on we must) with what we have (whatever that may be). We gotta live as if we're here, I reckon. And wilfully so.
>Derrida never says that your intentions (or anyone's intentions)
>aren't clear to you or anyone else, only that those intentions don't
>circumscribe the meanings that can be made of your statements.
Humpty Dumpty is one of very few who ever thought otherwise ('a word means what I mean it to mean'). See the note I just pulsed at Ken on mutual understanding if the meaning ( ... you'll ascribe to the meaning ... ) I ascribe to Habermas is of interest.
>Put differently: Derrida says that, instead of "deformations" of your
>intentions being marginal or accidental--deformations such as "lies" or
>"deception," "taking someone's words out of context"--the possibility of
>lying, deception, or taking someone's words out of context is "built-in" to
>the structure of utterances. That is, they are not "accidents" against which
>there is some "normative" mode of enunciation. They are as much a part, tho
>not necessarily more a part, of "communication" as "good intentions,"
>"clarity," "non-irony," "saying exactly what you mean," "meaning exactly
>what you say" and so on. All constructions of meaning (not just lies,
>deception, and taking someone's words out of context) are conventional,
>historical, and depend on the agreement, the AGENCY of people ("speaking
>subjects," in the lingo) involved.
Abso-bloody-lutely! Wittgenstein couldn't have put it any better.
Still, and I don't mean to be this annoying (it's so bloody late it's early), the unoriginal Derrida I understand you to understand makes more sense to me than the original one I understood myself to misunderstand.
Anyway, I've filed your post in my Derrida file. It might even help me understand the other bits'n'pieces in there ...
Cheers, Rob.