Re: Derrida

Harold Hietala (hhietala@SUN.CIS.SMU.EDU)
Thu, 7 Apr 1994 19:47:34 -0500

On Thu, 7 Apr 1994, Stephanie Nelson wrote:

> Christopher Pound's response to Steve Yee's diatribe against Derrida was
> useful and gracious. I would not have been so generous. I find the fact
> that a professional academic would proudly proclaim that after reading one
> essay by a difficult author, he now no longer will read anything else
> by that author, and also excises any other authors who make use of him
> from his reading list, absolutely terrifying and deeply depressing. This sort
> of smug, provincial, academic facism gives the tenure system a bad name.
>
> I invite you all to check out the Derrida list [Derrida@cfrvm], where you
> will find many illustrious scholars carrying on deeply thought-provoking
> discussions of subjects, cultures, interpretation, politics, etc., from a
> Derridean perspective. The level of scholarship on the list is astonishing.
> Its membership is worldwide and quite eclectic. One of its more active voices
> is Bob Scholes, whose work on reading signs and texts you may know. He is
> undoubtedly the leading exponent of Levi-Strauss in the world today.
>
> And on another front, I find Bonnie's remarks that the world would be a lot
> better place if we started thinking globally and got rid of all our religious
> texts to be ethnocentric and elitist, denying the deep convictions and wealthy
> cultural heritages of the majority of peoples on this planet.
>
> Stephanie Nelson (who is having a bad Anthro-L day)

I ponder the question: Is it the same? - "Derridean"
"Branch Davidean"