A PROPÓSITO DE SAUSSURE*

A propósito de S. o que penso é isto (que escrevi em inglês “porque” estava em Inglaterra); “significado transcendental” e a sua concepção de “substância fónica” (vínculo natural entre pensamento e voz, como se a voz estivesse mais próxima do significado) não são a minha onda:

Derrida acknowledges Saussure’s critique of “tradition” as important in its marking that the signifier and the signified are as inseparable as two sides of the same leaf. However, Derrida criticizes Saussure for not excluding the possibility of “thinking a concept signified in and of itself, a concept simply present for thought, independent of a relationship to language, that is of a relationship to a system of signifiers” (Derrida, 1981 p19). That is to say, Derrida is questioning the possibility of what he calls a “transcendental signified”, one that is independent of language and does not suffer its imprints. The fact that Saussure privileges the phonic substance (roughly, the sound of the word) stems from his belief that there is a natural link between thought and voice, meaning and sound, as if the voice was closer to the signified and the signifier could erase itself in order to allow the concept, the signified, to present itself in the voice of the speaker. Derrida notes how Sausurre fails to overcome a theory (a modernist theory) that simply claims that “communication presupposes subjects (whose identity and presence are constituted before the signifying operation) and objects (signified concepts, a thought meaning that the passage of communication will have neither to constitute, nor, by all rights, to transform). A communicates B to C.” (Derrida, 1981 p23).

*respigado de uma notita antiga; o livro citado é: Derrida, J. (1981) Positions. London: The Athlone Press.; obrigado henrique e dama, com a conversa até encontrei uns ficheiros que julgava desaparecidos :)

Rui Costa