Vana Tentokali School of Architecture. Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. Greece 75
to reverse the hierarchy” (Derrida 1981, 1). Derrida goes further arguing that, in a
traditional pair of opposition, any opposition exists, but a difference. He introduces as
a neologism the word “differance”. According to “differance”, in a traditional pair of
opposition, for instance a and b, “that which is different than a is not that which is the
other, such as b, but that which is different within the same a, within the same word”
(Derrida 1996). In a few words, while structuralism is generally satisfied if it can carve
up a text into binary oppositions, deconstruction, on the contrary, has sought to undo
them. It is not argued here, of course, that deconstruction is limited to the undoing of
binary oppositions; but that even an attempt at a reading, if not an interpretation of
Deconstruction, constitutes a very complicated, and always a controversial, task. But
the notion of undoing will be discussed later.
Fundamental basis for the Derridean discourse is the notion of “textuality”. Accord-
ing to Derrida’s notion of "textuality” “the social reality is considered as a ‘text’”. Text
though, is “not quite an extension of familiar concept, but a displacement or re-inscrip-
tion of it...Text is not a mediation between language and world, but the milieu in which
such distinction might be drawn. Text in general is any system of marks, traces, referrals.
Perception is a text” (Bennington 1989, 8).
Thus if the social reality is considered as a “text”, then the way (or ways) of approach-
ing, touching, understanding it, is (or are) through “reading(s)”. For deconstruction
though, a “reading” is not a simple process of interpreting. “A ‘reading’ does not empha-
size only on what is present. A reading emphasizes also on what is not present in the
text» (see, e.g., Colomina 1992a and b, 199; Wigley 1992a and b). “It is nor a process
of deciphering. It is neither entirely respectful nor simply violent. Secure production of
insecurity. Reading is not performed by a subject set against the text as object: Read-
ing is imbricated in the text it reads. Leave a trace in the text if you can” (Bennington
1989, 8).
The gender branch
Since one of the most historically virulent binary oppositions is between man and wom-
an, the theories of deconstruction of gender are spread over philosophy, psychoanalysis,
literary criticism, architecture. Among them, the psychonalytical theories by H.Cixous,
L.Irigaray, and J.Kristeva, are the most influential. They do not offer a new unifying
gendered theory as a response to Derridean deconstructive discourse, but interpret
and further explore it displacing the role of the subject. Instead of interlocking the
boundaries between the above mentioned disciplines in their epistemological core,
their discourse dismantles them in an inter-disciplinary way. I will be limited here for
the needs of this study very briefly on the psychoanalytical discourse of H.Cixous.
Cixous does not impose the distinction between female and male to the biological
sexes, but rather argues that the potential for "masculine" and "feminine" is present
in both sexes. She shows how our gender identities are not fixed to one sex or the other,
but mediate between them over a fluctuating and wide range of possibilities. To insist
on the "feminine" as a position open to both men and women does not, however, mean
to deny the fact of biological sex differences. If Cixous chooses the terms "masculine"
and "feminine", it is because they have a grounding in cultural fact. In a final analysis
she calls for a new attitude toward dif ference, which will involve as "feminine" the
acceptance of whatever is recognized as "other" (Sellers 1988, 3).