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The Birth of Deconstruction out of the Spirit of Phenomenology Paola Marrati. Genesis and Trace: Derrida Reading Husserl and Heidegger. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2005. xiv + 258 pp. $57.95, cloth, ISBN 978-0-8047-3915-3. Reviewed by Nicholas D. Liberto Published on H-German (August, 2005) Much of the recent scholarship on Jacques of the other authors with whom Derrida has con‐ Derrida has moved away from according his char‐ cerned himself. Not even Heidegger" (p. 181). acteristic "deconstructive method" a narrow rele‐ Genesis and Trace was originally published in vance primarily to literary criticism towards ap‐ French in 1998, when the author worked at the preciating its merits as a critical philosophical Marc Bloch University in Strasbourg.[2] There the project unto itself. This interpretive trend sees de‐ book developed through her close collaboration construction as a constructive engagement with with the philosophers Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe the critique of Western metaphysics in the twenti‐ and Jean-Luc Nancy. The original French edition eth century. One effort in this direction has been appeared through Kluwer Academic Publishers in to recapture Derrida's early reading of Edmund the Netherlands in its series on Husserl.[3] Husserl's phenomenology. Paola Marrati's work is Wolters Kluwer also publishes the journal Husserl an attempt to rethink this relation of influence. Studies. Marrati's book carries the traces of these For Marrati, as early as his dissertation of 1953-54, elements of production and publication. The lan‐ the young Derrida produced a "singular interpre‐ guage and structure of the text will be relatively tation" of Husserl's work that was to lead the lat‐ inaccessible for those unversed in the language of ter to formulate the questions that would concern Husserl's phenomenology or unfamiliar with the him in his subsequent career.[1] Moreover, key terms of Derridian philosophy. This problem Husserl proves to be a more substantial and pro‐ is complicated further by the fact that the author ductive influence for Derrida than any other employs this Derridian language and style seam‐ philosopher--even Martin Heidegger. The author lessly, with no interest in translating it for a non- explicitly concludes "Deconstruction ... is born in specialist audience. More importantly, for those Derrida's work on Husserl; more than this, how‐ unacquainted with the influence of Husserl's phe‐ ever, it is born in the work that Derrida has done nomenology in French academic philosophy, with Husserl, thanks to him and, ultimately, which began in the early 1930s and continued against him, something that cannot be said of any H-Net Reviews into the postwar era, or with Derrida's own admit‐ coming. The discovery of this contamination leads tedly outsider status in the acadmie, I fear the Derrida to challenge the tenability of the phe‐ stakes of Marrati's work may be a mystery. This nomenological reduction. Husserl maintained situation is not helped by Marrati's reluctance to that the practiced phenomenologist could "brack‐ state these concerns explicitly at the outset or to et out" or "place in abeyance" (epoch;) the "natu‐ provide anything more than an internal exegesis ral attitude" or "prepredicative" way in which we of the philosophical texts. Although I certainly attend to objects in the intersubjective world of feel this book must be admired for its own merits, experience (Lebenswelt), thereby throwing into as a work of intense philosophical interpretation relief the transcendental acts of consciousness or and certainly an important contribution to our of a transcendental subject. Of course, the practice understanding of Derrida's development, I want of phenomenological reduction was always the re‐ to suggest that a broader consideration of the his‐ sult of an attempt to ground phenomenology's torical genesis--to use her key term--would both own reflection: it was not only a method but also strengthen her argument and render it more ac‐ the result of its practice and the proof of the possi‐ cessible to a wider audience of philosophers and bility of phenomenology as theoretic reflection.[4] intellectual historians. Similarly, Marrati suggests that Derrida discovers After exploring some of Marrati's main in investigating the problem of genesis the un‐ points, I would like to raise the issue of what is avoidable paradox in the reduction as method implicit in the authors attempt to locate the birth and result of phenomenological reflection. De‐ of deconstruction in Derrida's early philosophical spite the phenomenologists effort to isolate the thought. Her insistence on the "singularity" and pure activity of consciousness, these acts always independence of the origin of deconstruction can refer back to or "intend" an ontology that is al‐ be viewed as an act of legitimation of Derrida's ready in place, a genesis that is "always already" philosophical project, which leads her to elide the constituted by a passive temporal synthesis (p. historical and intellectual context of this recep‐ 15). Husserl holds onto the supposition that the tion in favor of a purely internal reading. What is separation of the phenomenological from the nat‐ more, this narrow focus on the internal connec‐ ural attitude as well as the separation of transcen‐ tions between philosophical texts would seem to dent and empirical life is possible in phenomeno‐ belie the fundamental Derridian point about the logical reflection. Derrida introduces "contamina‐ ambivalence of any pure "birth" or origin. tion" as the inability to dissociate the world in its historical becoming from the becoming of the Marrati makes the basic claim that the per‐ world in transcendental consciousness. We can sisting questions of Derridas deconstruction arise see incipient in this analysis a critique of "meta‐ out of his criticism of Husserls phenomenology. physical presence" that was to be the mainstay of The most important of these questions is what Derrida's deconstruction. In Husserl's phe‐ Derrida calls the "contamination" of the empirical nomenological reduction, Derrida discovers the and the transcendental. For Marrati, Derrida ar‐ impossibility of a "pure presence" of thoughts for rives at this question through his thinking "with consciousness precisely by recovering the "trace" and against" the problem of genesis in Husserl's of its worldly genesis. task of transcendentally grounding philosophical reflection. Contamination designates the continu‐ Derrida develops this point further through ing presence of the fnite in the infinite, of the criticism of the linguistic implications of the phe‐ temporal in the eternal, and the insurmountable nomenological way of thinking. Language serves paradox of worldly genesis as both origin and be‐ as "the fundamental condition of possibility of phenomenological difference" (p. 52). If transcen‐ 2 H-Net Reviews dental reduction is the means to arriving at the tion (Destruktion) of the history of ontology (pp. theoretical attitude in acts consciousness, then the 114-116). The notion of contamination with which possibility for thematizing this content requires a Derrida confronts Husserl's transcendental reflec‐ phenomenological language. But, for Derrida, the tions can be mapped onto Heidegger's point of de‐ possibility of such a language rests on the split parture for the existential analytic of Dasein. Hei‐ that is made in the sign between its pure expres‐ degger denies Husserl's focus on transcendental sion and its indicative value. Phenomenology, in consciousness and the "bracketing" of the world it other words, requires "a purely expressive lan‐ requires; for Heidegger, self and world are con‐ guage" (p. 64). This state is achieved by viewing tained in Dasein. This state of affairs means that language as pure ideality, as in the example of what can be discovered in phenomenological in‐ imagination or fantasy. In Derrida's view, this ac‐ terpretation "already belongs to Dasein" even if it tivity amounts to the positing of a "solitary mental has the tendency in its everyday mode of being to life" of interiority over against an "other" exterior "cover up" these ontological issues. Marrati re‐ world--the intersubjectively constituted world--to veals how Derrida concludes that Heidegger's ex‐ which it need not refer, but which will always re‐ istential analytic requires the "epoch of all meta‐ main as a "trace" or contamination of its worldly physical interpretation" and the naming of Dasein origin. This is in part the problem and paradox of (p. 146). On this basis, Derrida claims that Heideg‐ the phenomenological reduction being both pro‐ ger ultimately fails to throw off the traditional op‐ ductive of theoretical knowledge and the result of positions and ordering of metaphysics. its own practice: any supposedly pure theoretical Marrati follows this claim in an interesting presence must retain its "non-present" origin in discussion of the Heideggerian notion of "being time. As Marrati writes, "The possibility of a pure‐ towards death" as that which discloses to Dasein ly phenomenological language, of a language that its "ownmost" possibility. Many will be familiar can submit the world to epoch, is the very possi‐ with Heidegger's notion of being-towards-death bility of distinguishing body from soul within lan‐ developed in division 2 of Being and Time. This is guage itself. There is no absolute life, no absolute the notion that only when confronted with the po‐ living life unless the soul does not need the body" tentiality of death does Dasein fnd disclosed its (p. 62). On this basis, Derrida claims that Husserl "uttermost possibility" of authentically taking a fails to free transcendental refection from the tra‐ stand in existence. Death is a perfect point of en‐ ditional oppositions of metaphysics and the privi‐ try for a Derridian deconstruction because it is, leging of interiority (p. 52). We must recognize, for like writing, at once the site of a possibility and Derrida, the "diffrance" or limitation of a purely impossibility for being. Death is a universal expe‐ expressive language in a solitary mental dis‐ rience.
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