Philosopher of language and political thinker, Jaques Derrida, has died of pancreatic cancer at age 74 in a Paris hospital last week.



The charismatic French-Algerian philosopher was the founder of Deconstructive philosophy , the idea that the language of modern western thinking undermines the principles on which it purports to rest. Derridas methods would look at the internal contradictions of notions such as gender, race and sexuality to show that these concepts where never natural, but infact constructions to be questioned as readily as any other work of fiction.



Derida was also active in many political fields. Starting from resistance to the Vietnam-war, Czechoslovakia, apartheid and continuing to support of Palestinian intellectuals, immigrant voting rights, and against the death penalty , particularly in regard to Mumia abu Jamaal. He was an opponent of the Iraq invasion and wrote extensively on issues of justice and authoritarianism.

Links: Original story | Derridas Deconstruction of Authority | Saint Derrida and the Ghost of Marxism | Derrida article in Wikipedia

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Derida, always a contraversial figure, delighted in attacking the foundation schools of modernist thought and philosophy, and yet at its core, deconstructions core premises where based on a simple syllogistic logic, albeit one somewhat obscured by his complex syntax and neoglisms; A contradiction Derrida was well aware of and delighted in.



Derridas work both delighted and infuriated revolutionary and liberatory thinkers, by the seemingly contradictory paths of undermining authority while pointing out the authority generating function of revolutionary praxis. In this sense however Derrida's work pointed to new theories of anarchism that only now are beginning to be apreciated.



Famously, Derrida also defended Marxism , in 'specres of Marx', against the assaults of the conservative postmodernism of Fukyama, but also against the totalarianism of the marxisms that came after him. Derrida pointed out to Fukyama that if Capitalism had made its final exclaimation mark on history , it does so amidst the unprecedented poverty , chaos and squalor that modern capitalism represents.



Derrida would of found it interesting that in parallell to his writings on how the dna of language subverts the very words it creates , his disease was to perform a similar manover on the dna of his body. A process of creation and destruction. (de)Construction. Diference and repetition. Its an irony that would not of been lost on the man.



Derridas writings where obscure, difficult, and infuriating. And yet at the same time they where astounding, insightful, lyrical and joyous. Some called Derrida a prophet, some called him a fool.



Most just note that he kept things interesting.

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