Deconstruction in a Nutshell: The Very Idea (!)

Abstract

This chapter discusses the idea of deconstruction in a nutshell. The very meaning and mission of deconstruction is to show that things do not have definable meanings and determinable missions, that they are always more than any mission would impose, and that they exceed the boundaries they currently occupy. A “meaning” or a “mission” is a way to contain and compact things, like a nutshell, gathering them into a unity, whereas deconstruction bends all its efforts to stretch beyond these boundaries, to transgress confines, to interrupt and disjoin all such gathering. Whenever deconstruction finds a nutshell, the very idea is to crack it open and disturb this tranquility. The thrust of each of the questions put to Jacques Derrida in the “Roundtable” was to press him about the relevance of deconstruction to the most traditional values of institution, tradition, community, justice, and religion. Ultimately, Derrida was eloquent about the place of deconstruction at the heart of the most time-honored institutions.