POSTSTRUCTURALISM
Poststructuralism refers to an inter-disciplinary movement popular from the late 1970s,
which could be seen as a supplement to structuralism, and as an attempt to problematize
and challenge many of its assumptions. As with the relationship between postmodernism
and modernism, so too that between poststructuralism and structuralism is more complex
than might at first appear. Poststructuralism does not lend itself to any clear-cut
definition. Broadly speaking, however, poststructuralism sought to redress the
universalizing tendencies of structuralism by introducing a certain specificity into
discourse. Thus against the static and universal models of structuralism, poststructuralism
introduced notions of time and difference. The bar that separates signified from signifier
was seen by poststructuralists as less stable. Meaning, in other words, was never fixed,
and always subject to differals and play. Likewise poststructuralism challenged the
treatment of binary oppositions in structuralism, and sought to expose the fact that within
such oppositions one term is invariably privileged over the other. Nonetheless
poststructuralism should be understood not as a negation of structuralism, but as a
problematization, intent on augmenting and improving the structuralist project.
The problematization of structuralism was evident already in the work of Barthes,
where he stressed the transiency of the signified. Barthes called for an increase not in
functional studies of the city, but in readings of the city. Hélène Cixous seemingly
responds to Barthes’s call in her evocative readings of Prague. One may detect a similar
tendency in Jacques Derrida’s description of Bernard Tschumi’s follies at the Parc de la
Villette. For Derrida the follies in their folly become the site of play of meaning, of the
meaning of meaning. In effect Derrida reads his own philosophical project into the forms
of Tschumi’s architecture. Throughout the primacy of the text is stressed. The world
becomes treated as ‘text’ to be read inter-textually.
This shift from the static universalization of structuralism is evident in Foucault’s later
work, where he emphasizes not the simple, structured classification of space, but the
power/knowledge axis which controls social behaviour. Deleuze takes this argument
further. Human beings can be seen to be controlled no longer by physical walls, but by
more ‘gaseous’ concepts such as credit. Virilio also addresses the erosion of the authority
of the architectonic. The physicality of the traditional door and window must give way to
the metaphorical window of the VDU console. Andrew Benjamin fits less happily into
this category. Yet within his engagement with Peter Eisenman there is evidence of a
strategic challenging of received concepts, which is the hallmark of poststructuralism.
Poststructuralism has been accused by its critics of leading to a possible relativism,
and always threatening negation. The potential for a constant deferral of meaning, they
would claim, seems to infer that we can never fully access the object of our reading. Yet
supporters of poststructuralism would claim that this criticism is misguided. Indeed, as
Derrida has convincing argued, it is rather hermeneutics which risks a potential
relativism. By contrast, deconstruction, for example, serves as an epistemological check
against the appropriations of hermeneutics. Thus, far from promoting relativism, in some
respects poststructuralism could be seen as a defence against relativism. Likewise, far
from advocating negation, poststructuralism could be seen to be premised on affirmation,
although the possibility for negation must always be left open.