Daily Dialectic

Is this what intersubjectivity really looks like, or do I need to lay off Derrida?

In this talk, I argue for a surprisingly violent way of thinking about intersubjectivity. I start with Derrida’s understanding of the process by which meaning is extracted from a text, and from that extrapolate a way of understanding the manner by which one ‘makes sense’ of another. I will argue that in ‘Derridean terms’, as I read Derrida, we ‘make sense’ of the other violently, and can only make ourselves understood by doing violence to ourselves. I will illustrate this with the aid of a cast from Greek mythology: Apollo, Dionysus, Perseus, Medusa and Oedipus. Time permitting, I will also invoke Ludacris.