What is it? Deconstruction: A school of philosophy that
originated in France in the late 1960s, has had an enormous
impact on Anglo-American criticism. Largely the creation of its
chief proponent Jacques Derrida, deconstruction upends the
Western metaphysical tradition. It represents a complex response
to a variety of theoretical and philosophical movements of the
20th century, most notably Husserlian phenomenology, Saussurean
and French structuralism, and Freudian and Lacanian
psychoanalysis. [First paragraph of a seven-page explanation in
the Encyclopedia of Contemporary Literary Theory (Toronto:
University of Toronto Press, 1993).] Deconstruction: The term
denotes a particular kind of practice in reading and, thereby, a
method of criticism and mode of analytical inquiry. In her book
The Critical Difference (1981), Barbara Johnson clarifies the
term: "Deconstruction is not synonymous with "destruction",
however. It is in fact much closer to the original meaning of
the word 'analysis' itself, which etymologi