Of Deconstruction in America 453
Even physically, the change was very evident. In the United
States, Derrida always seemed to me more radiant and imposing.
The way he had become a kind of star – which never happened in
France – of course played a part in this. At the start of the 1980s,
many departments had been won over by ‘French Theory’ and
Derrida’s thought. It had all started in French departments,
then those of comparative literature. But architecture, aesthet-
ics, anthropology, and law soon became receptive. The idea of
deconstruction, which made it possible to create bridges between
the disciplines, aroused immense enthusiasm. This was the
period when ‘cultural studies’ really became important. Many
professors demanded that their students position themselves vis-
à-vis Derrida. This became a mandatory fi rst stage, whatever the
subject. These sudden crazes are a very American phenomenon... The only domain that remained really hostile to deconstruc-
tion was philosophy, a fact that lay behind a certain number of
misunderstandings and false trails. For access to Derrida’s work
was often without the fi rst-hand philosophical knowledge that
was necessary. Many professors, and even more students, had
no previous philosophical training and approached Plato, Kant,
or Hegel through what Derrida said about them.^10
This is also the opinion of Rodolphe Gasché, one of Derrida’s
fi rst disciples, in his book The Tain of the Mirror.^11 In his view,
Derrida’s oeuvre is profoundly and self-evidently philosophical; if
its literary angle is highlighted, it cannot fail to be distorted. But
according to others, the main contribution of deconstruction is of
a very diff erent kind. This is the position ardently put forward by
Avital Ronell in Fighting Theory, her book of interviews with Anne
Dufourmantelle:
One can’t imagine how whited-out the academic corridor was
when Derrida arrived on the American scene. There was really
no room for deviancy, not even for a quaint aberration or
psychoanalysis. Besides off ering up the luminous works that
bore his signature, Derrida cleared spaces that looked like
obstacle courses for anyone who did not fi t the professorial
profi le at the time. He practiced, whether consciously or not,
a politics of contamination. His political views, refi ned and,
by our measure, distinctly leftist, knew few borders and bled
into the most pastoral sites and hallowed grounds of higher
learning. Suddenly color was added to the university – color
and sassy women, something that would not easily be for-
given. [.. .] Derrida blew into our town-and-gown groves with
protofeminist energy, often, and at great cost to the protocols
of philosophical gravity, passing as a woman.^12