Summary
Gilles Deleuze: How structuralism is recognized
"We rightly identify linguistics as the beginning of structuralism: not only de Saussure, but also the Moscow and Prague schools. And if structuralism spreads further to other areas, then it is no longer a question of analogy: it does not simply happen to establish methods "equivalent" to those that first succeeded in the analysis of language. There really is no structure that is not language, even if it is esoteric or even non-verbal language. The structure of the unconscious exists only insofar as the unconscious speaks, which is the unconscious language. The structure of the body exists only insofar as bodies, it is thought, speak the language of symptoms. Things themselves have a structure only insofar as they carry on a silent conversation, and that in sign language. The question "what is structuralism?" it transforms even more - it would be better to ask: how do we recognize those we call structuralists? And what is it that they themselves recognize? What do they, the structuralists, do in order to recognize in something the language specific to a particular field? What do they find in that area? For ourselves, therefore, we suggest that we only single out certain formal recognition criteria, the simplest ones, referring each time to the examples of the aforementioned authors, no matter how different their works and projects may be."
Gilles Deleuze
Biblos Newsletter
New titles, special copies and quiet recommendations from the antiquarian bookshop.