Husserl Studies 4:45-62 (1987)

© Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, Dordrecht - Printed in the Netherlands

Reconstructing Husserl: A critical response to Denida's

Speech and Phenomena

A L A N WHITE
Williams College

Jacques Derrida tells us, in a voice many are inclined to heed, that
the history of metaphysics, and therefore that of philosophy, is
"closed." "As for what 'begins'" after this closure, he continues,
"unheard-of thoughts are required, sought across the memory of
old signs." Where are these "unheard-of thoughts" to be heard?
"In the openness of an unheard-of question that opens neither
upon knowledge nor upon some nonknowledge which is a knowl-
edge to come. In the openness of this question we no longer
know. ''2 The time is past for knowing, and for trying to know;
the time is also past for philosophy, insofar as philosophy is the
search for wisdom, and wisdom a form of knowledge. The time
has come for what Derrida, following Heidegger, calls "thinking."
For Derrida as for Heidegger, the move to thinking is a positive
one in that it is a move to the kind of intellectual activity approp-
riate in the final quarter of the twentieth century. But its positivi-
ty is not pure: it is won through the negation of a negativity,
namely, of philosophy as closed, and therefore no longer approp-
riate. To be sure, the negation of negation is not a total oblitera-
tion: thinking must have something to think about, and the "old
signs" through which it seeks its "unheard-of thoughts" are often
traditional philosophical texts. Nevertheless, retention of the
tradition in these terms remains a negation, in that the texts are
pre-understood as "philosophical," and therefore as self-destruc-
tive: they are assumed to be rent by fissures, to be grounded in
unfounded presuppositions that they do not recognize. As "think-
ers," we may seek something in Husserlian or Hegelian texts, but
what we seek is certainly neither the first philosophy Husserl
46

sought to establish nor the absolute knowing Hegel sought to

provide; as "thinkers," we know in advance that Hegel and Husserl
failed.
Derridian thought may be positive in a second sense as well:
it may be interesting and/or provocative and/or instructive and/or
enlightening, and it may be any or all of these things even to
philosophers, even to those who suspect or reject Derrida's estima-
tion of the continuing vitality of the tradition. One may argue,
on the one hand, that Derrida's "negation of negation" fails in
that he misrepresents some or all of the philosophers he "decon-
structs" (so that the negations he negates are straw men), while
acknowledging, on the other, that what Derrida says concerning
signs and language may be of interest - even of philosophical
interest.
In this critical response to Derrida, I attempt to evaluate a part
of the Derridian negation, abstracting as far as possible from his
own position. I consider one of the earlier texts in which Derrida
discusses the closure of metaphysics, the book Speech and Phe-
nomena. My aim is modest in two ways, first in that my primary
concern is not with what Derrida says for himself, but rather with
what he takes Husserl to have said. Second, I do not concentrate
on the general reflections on Husserl Derrida includes in order
"to indicate the principle of a general interpretation of Husserl's
thought and to sketch that systematic reading which we hope to
try one day" (VP:I,n2/SP:4,n2); I focus instead on Derrida's
detailed critique of the first chapter of the first Logical Investiga-
tion; I argue that the critique fails.
Although this aim is modest in comparison with, for example,
a comprehensive evaluation of the Derridian project, it is not
trivial. Derrida insists that the defects of the entire Husserlian
project - indeed, of "the whole of phenomenology" - a r e implic-
it in the distinction between indication and expression developed
in the first Investigation. 3 I argue that Derrida's critique is vitiated
by his failure to recognize the subtleties of Husserrs account of
the interplay of presence and absence, of immanence and transcen-
dence, of filled and empty intentions. My argument gains addi-
tional significance from the fact that an essential premise in the
Heideggerian-Derridian argument for the closure of philosophy
is that all philosophers are Platonists in that all have shared a faith
 47

in "the founding value of presence." Although I focus on Husserl,

I mean to point to a danger implicit in the thesis that the history
of philosophy in a history of successive positings of being as
presence: the thesis functions, at its worst, as a presupposition
that masks the richness and with it the value of the philosophical
tradition.

§ 1. Expression and indication

Derrida attempts to convict Husserl of Platonism by identifying

strong Husserlian distinctions between the present and the absent,
the filled and the empty, the ideal and the real, the permanent
and the transient, the identical and the different, the rational and
the irrational, and the clear and the ambiguous. According to
Derrida, Husserl seeks to banish the latter member of each pair
from the realm of transcendental philosophy, and to establish the
former member as a norm. 4 The Husserlian, as seen by Derrida,
must strive for presence, fullness, ideality, permanence, identity,
rationality, and clarity - as have, according to Heidegger and
Derrida, all metaphysicians since Plato. Derrida argues or implies
that none of the purported norms can ever be found in its pure
state, and that only Husserl's presupposed and unexamined meta-
physical interests allow him to believe otherwise.
The presumed Platonistic flaw pervades Husserl's work; it is,
according to Derrida, implicit as early as the first Investigation's
opening chapter:

a patient reading of [this part of] the Investigations would

show the germinal structure of the whole of Husserl's thought.
... the first of the Investigations ("Expression and Meaning")
opens with a chapter devoted to some "essential distinctions"
which rigorously command all the subsequent analyses. (VP:
1-2/SP:3-4)

One need not even read the entire first chapter to find Husserl's
crucial error; it is visible in the opening sentences:
48

the coherence of this chapter is entirely d u e to a distinction

proposed in the first paragraph: the word "sign" (Zeichen)
will have a "twofold sense" (ein Doppelsinn); "sign" may
signify "expression" (Ausdruck) or "indication" (Anzeichen).
(FP:2/SP:4)

Derrida's objection is that Husserl's distinction between expres-

sion and indication exhibits the Platonistic flaw. Because Husserl
fails to ask the question concerning "the structure of the sign in
general" (FP:23/SP:23), he takes the full presence of expression
to be possible in isolation from the absence involved in indication.
The result of Husserl's confusion is an impossible project: Hus-
serl's pure logical grammar must study expression in its purity,
independent of indication, but, according to Derrida, expression
cannot be separated from indication. And if it cannot, Husserl's
entire undertaking - even in the mature form of the Cartesian
Meditations and the Crisis - is compromised:

Hussed's whole enterprise - and far beyond the Investigations

-would be threatened if the Verflechtung [interweaving]
which couples the indicative sign to expression were absolutely
irreducible, if it were in principle inextricable and if indication
were essentially internal to the movement of expression rather
than being only conjoined to it, however tenaciously. (VP:28/
SP:27)

The relation of expression to indication is, then, the starting

point for Derrida's analysis: the problems implicit in Husserl's
treatment of the relation point us toward the deeper stratum -
invisible to Husserl - where the difficulties originate. What then
are those problems? Husserl acknowledges that the two functions
are "interwoven" (verflochten) in communicative speech, but
asserts (1) that they are always distinguishable, and (2) that in
inner speech, in "the solitary life of the soul" (im einsamen
Seelenleben), there is expression but no indication. For Derrida,
the second assertion is crucial. He assumes, overhastily, that
Husserl can establish pure logical grammar as a field of study
only if he can prove that inner speech is free from indication:
 49

there is no sure criterion by which to distinguish an outward

language from an inward language ... Such a distinction, how-
ever, is indispensable to Husserl for proving that indication is
exterior to expression, with all that entails. (VP: 63/SP: 56)

One must admit that the criterion for the distinction between
expression and indication in the end rests on the all too summa-
ry description o f "inner life." ( VP: 78/SP: 70)

Not all Husserlians would agree with the Derridian assumption

that the analysis o f inner speech is essential to Husserl's argument.
J.N. Mohanty takes that analysis to be not only unnecessary, but
misleading: "It is in the fitness of things ... that [Husserl] should
not have, quite contrary to his real intentions, relied on the con-
trast between private and public thinking in the manner he does. ''s
Before we consider this issue, a prior question must be con-
sidered: w h y is Derrida so convinced that, for Husserl, "the cri-
terion for the distinction between indication and expression...
rests on the.., description of 'inner life'"? I see two related
reasons. The first is that Derrida attributes to Husserl the teachings
(1) that expression and indication are mutually exclusive but con-
jointly exhaustive species of signs - to function signitively is
either to express or to indicate, and not both - ; and (2) that the
two types of signification differ in that what is signified expres-
sively is made present - wholly "inner," immanent - through the
signification, whereas what is signified indicatively is made visible
as absent, as "outside," transcendent (see VP:22-23,47-48/SP:
22,43).
Derrida raises two objections to these putative teachings: (1)
had Husserl considered the essence of signification, he would
have seen that all signitive functions are mediated by the outside,
the transcendent - thus, by what cannot be fully present - and
(2) although Husserl initially excludes indication and absence
from expression, he will later be unable to avoid including both
within the expressive function - he will be forced to admit that
any locution 6 that expresses a meaning must necessarily, at the
same time, indicate something else.
The importance of these objections - particularly the second -
is visible in light of the second reason for Derrida's conviction
50

that inner speech is the cornerstone of Husserl's argument: Derri-

da assumes that only if expression can be actually (rather than
merely logically) isolated from indication - only if we can identi-
fy specific locutions that express without indicating - only then
can Husserl's projected "pure logical grammar," a normative
discipline for language, be developed.
According to Derrida's Husserl, any signitive relation to empiri-
cal, real, temporal things is a relation of indication, because such
things are never fully present (in Husserlian terms: various profiles
of the perceptual object may be brought to full presence, but
presentation of all possible profiles of the object is an eidetic
impossibility). The expressive relation, as non-indicating, can only
be to meanings, which are a priori, ideal, and omnitemporal, and
which are necessarily present - immanent - whenever words func-
tion as expressions. When I speak to others, I provide them with
indications of m y own mental acts or states, which they do not
perceive; communicative speech is therefore permeated by ab-
sence. When I speak to myself, I may be directly aware of m y
mental acts or states, so there, perhaps, we might find expression
free from indication.
I reiterate Derrida's two objections: (1) all signs point to what
is absent - all signification is mediated by transcendence - ; (2)
expression cannot be distinguished from indication, and therefore
cannot be made fully immanent. I hope I have made the objec-
tions clear; I now turn to the problematic assumptions on which
they are based. First, Husserl does not assert that expression (of
meaning) on the one hand, and indication on the other, are the
only types of signs. He comes closest to doing so in referring to
"an ambiguity (Doppelsinn; literally, "double-meaning") o f the
term 'sign,'" but even there he speaks o f an ambiguity rather than
of the ambiguity. I argue below that the Husserlian relation be-
tween a locution and its object is signitive (in the Husserlian sense
of "pointing toward"), although it is distinguishable both from
expression of meaning and from indication. Second, Husserl
does not assert that what a locution expresses need be fully
present: as we will see, a locution is understood only if its meaning
is present, but according to Husserl the locution also expresses
its object, and the presence or absence of the object does not
affect the presence o f the meaning.
 51

As these considerations suggest, the conflict between Husserl and

Derrida concerning indication and expression is based in a deeper
conflict concerning the relation of the locution to its object.
According to both, that relation is present in inner as well as in
communicative speech, and for both, that relation is different
from the locution's relation to its meaning, on the one hand, and
to the mental acts it may indicate, on the other. Derrida, wrongly
assuming that if, for Husserl, the relation is not one of expression
it must be one o f indication, claims that he has found a fatal flaw:
indication - mediation by transcendence - is essential to all
language, so Husserl's projected isolation o f expression is futile.
I have attempted to present the basis of the conflict clearly.
The Derridian text does not present it clearly, in part because
Derrida does not consistently recognize that Husserl distinguishes
between a locution's meaning and its object in the first place.
Frege makes the distinction, referring to the object as the locu-
tion's Bedeutung, the meaning as its Sinn. But Derrida reminds us
more than once that, "as is well known, contrary to Frege, Husserl
in the Investigations makes no distinction between Sinn and Be-
deutung" (VP:18; see 19/SP: 18; see 19). This is literally true in
that Husserl uses both Sinn and Bedeutung to refer to meaning
- Frege's Sinn - but Derrida's objection is misleading in that
Husserl has an additional term - Gegenstand - to name the
object - Frege's Bedeutung. The distinction itself is of central
importance for Husserl; indeed, if Mohanty's recent arguments
are accepted, it is originally a Husserlian rather than a Fregean
distinction. 7 But be its origin as it may, the distinction is central
in the Investigations, and that Husserl uses terms different from
Frege's in making it is philosophically irrelevant. 8
What is philosophically irrelevant may, however, be rhetorically
decisive. The strategic importance of Derrida's terminological
objection is indicated in the following passage (among others):

As long as we identify Sinn and Bedeutung, nothing that re-

sists interpretation (Deutung) can have sense or be language in
the strict sense. The essence o f language is in its telos; and its
telos is voluntary consciousness as meaning (comme vouloir-
dire). The indicative sphere which remains outside expression
so defined circumscribes the failure of this telos. However
52

interwoven with expression, the indicative sphere represents

everything that cannot itself be brought into deliberate and
meaningful speech. (VP:38/SP:36)

The subtext is that a locution expresses only Sinn or Bedeutung,

and that Husserl's lack of distinction between the two reveals
that he takes the locution to express only a meaning, not an ob-
ject. Derrida does not refer, here or elsewhere, to passages in
which Husserl insists that what the locution primarily expresses
is not the meaning, but rather, precisely, the "expressed (named)
object ''9 - which is certainly not "language in the strict sense,"
and usually cannot be immanent. For example:

in so far as we ... yield ourselves to enacting the meaning-

intention and its further fulfillment, our whole interest centers
upon the object intended in our intention, and named by its
means (Hua X I X / 1 , 4 6 ; LI:282)

Our interest, our intention, our thought - mere synonyms if

taken in sufficiently wide senses - point exclusively to the
thing meant in the sense-giving act. (Hua XIX/1, 47; LI:283)

Derrida's objection is that for Husserl, a locution expresses

only its meaning, and therefore indicates its object. If that were
indeed Husserl's teaching, then, since his phenomenology o f
language concerns only expression - not indication - it would be
arbitrarily 'and perversely abstract: that we generally talk about
things and events rather than about language would be, for Derri-
da's Husserl, irrelevant.
This objection is fully dependent on the assumption that, for
Husserl, the signitive relation between locution and object is one
o f indication. The assumption is false. To see why it is false, we
must turn from Derrida's interpretation of Husserlian indication
to Husserl's own doctrine. For Husserl, an indicative relation is
one in which the indicator is present, the indicated necessarily
absent: the canals of Mars (which I see through m y telescope)
may indicate the existence of Martian canal-builders, but they
can do so only so long as I do not see the Martians themselves. If I
should spot Martians through the telescope, the canals would no
 53

longer function as indications of their existence. Similarly, I may

take lighted windows in a house as an indication that someone is
home, but if I see the inhabitants through the window, the lights
cease to function as indications.
What then o f the locution and its object? The expressed object,
like the indicated object, may be absent when the expressed mean-
ing is present: I can say or write, "Derrida's critique fails," and
know the meaning of the assertion even if I am not looking at
the book, even if I am not thinking about it, even if I have no idea
what it says or concerns. In the last case, I would presumably be
parroting something I had heard, but the situation would remain
distinct from one in which I parroted a foreign phrase I did not
understand. In Husserlian terms, what distinguishes the former
case from the latter is m y apprehension o f the meaning o f "Derri-
da's critique fails." If I know nothing about the critique, the locu-
tion continues to function expressively although its object is
wholly absent. In that such total absence is possible, the ex-
pressed object is like the indicated object; the difference between
them is that the expressed object may continue to be expressed
even if it is present; as we have seen, if the indicated object is
present, it is no longer indicated. If I see the Martians, the canals
cease to function indicatively, but m y words about the Martians
continue to function expressively, and they continue to express
both a meaning and an object. Similarly, I can make assertions
about Derrida's critique while thinking about it. 1°
Given this analysis of presence and absence, the relation o f a
locution to its object is differentiable from the relation of an
indicator to what it indicates, and the differentiation requires
no allusion to inward speech. But the question remains: according
to Husserl, what sort of indication is "interwoven" with expres-
sion in cases of communicative speech? Returning to my earlier
example, whenever anyone utters or writes, "Derrida's critique
fails," that may indicate to the reader or hearer that the speaker
believes that the critique is inadequate. The locution, which is
given, and thus present, indicates to the hearer an act or habit of
belief that is not given, and thus remains absent. The indication
may or may not be reliable; the speaker may be lying. But be that
as it may, the speaker's mental act can only be indicated to the
hearer, it can never be present as "it itself": the speaker's mental
54

act can be immanent only to the speaker. On the other hand, in

cases where I honestly report what I take myself to believe, then
what I say cannot indicate m y belief to me, in that indication of
present objects is impossible.
There are, then, two peculiarities of inner speech: (1) it is
possible for me to express to myself an object - m y act or habit
or belief - that I can only indicate to another; and (2) in certain
cases, it is impossible for me to indicate the objects I express in
inner speech. This second characteristic leads us to another prob-
lem identified by Derrida, who assumes that in no case can I indi-
cate to myself, in inner speech, m y own acts or beliefs:

I this to say that in speaking to myself I communicate nothing

to myself?.... Do I not then modify myself?. Do I learn nothing
about myself?. ( FP: 45/SP:41 )

Is it also to say that in public speech, I never learn anything about

myself from what I say? Do I make no Freudian slips, or if I do,
are they inacessible to me? These questions are vital if, as Derrida
insists, "the whole theory of signification introduced in this first
chapter devoted to essential distinctions would collapse" if the
indicative function were not wholly absent from inner speech. Yet
Derrida's rhetorical questions get the answers he seeks only if
Husserl's distinction requires that I never indicate anything to
myself. It does not. It is enough, for Husserl's purposes, if there
are some cases where m y locutions indicate to others what need
not be indicated to me.
To make this clearer, we must consider what Husserl's purposes
are. Before I turn to those purposes, I reiterate the argument to
this point: Husserl and Derrida agree that every locution is related
(1) to its meaning, (2) to its object, and (3) to certain mental acts
or states of the user o f the locution. In addition, Derrida does not
deny that when a locution is understood, its meaning is neces-
sarily present, or that the presence or absence o f indicatable men-
tal acts or states is irrelevant as far as understanding o f meaning
is concerned. Finally, Derrida and Husserl agree that the object,
like the mental acts or states, may be present or absent. On the
basis of this last agreement, Derrida assumes that the relation
between locution and object must be, for Husserl, one o f indica-
 55

tion rather than one of expression. That assumption is unfounded.

What Derrida fails to see is that, according to Husserl, only absent
objects may be indicated, whereas objects that are expressed may
be either present or absent. The point is clear in Husserl's texts:
he stresses, in several passages, that locutions express their objects
as well as their meanings. I have been unable to find any Derridian
reference to any of those passages.

§ 2. Pure logical g r a m m a r

We must now consider the purposes of the Investigations, in order

to reconfirm that acknowledgment that the object is expressed
rather than indicated - despite its possible absence - does not
subvert the Husserlian project. In the parts of the text Derrida
considers, Husserl's primary purpose is to delineate a subject
matter for pure logical grammar. Derrida presents that subject
matter as follows:

When we speak of the purely grammatical, we mean that sys-

tem of rules which enables us to recognize whether or not a
discourse is, properly speaking, a discourse. Speech, to be sure,
must make sense; but do falsity and the absurdity of contra-
diction (Widersinnigkeit) necessarily make it unintelligible?
Do they necessarily deprive discourse of its experienced and
intelligible character, thereby rendering it sinnlos [senseless] ?
This grammar concerns only the logical a priori of language; it
is pure logical grammar.
This restriction is operative from the beginning... (VP:7/
SP:8)

The implication is clear: for Husserl, logical grammar is concerned

only with what is true and consistent; for Husserl, Derrida hints,
what is false or contradictory is senseless and unintelligible.
Derrida's implication, however, is simply false, as passages he
himself cites elsewhere indicate: much later, he acknowledges
- indeed, stresses - Husserl's recognition that speech can be both
meaningful and contradictory:
56

We know that pure logical grammar depends entirely on the

distinction between Widersinnigkeit and Sinnlosigkeit. If it
obeys certain rules, an expression may be widersinnig (contra-
dictory, false, absurd according to a certain kind of absurdity)
without ceasing to have an intelligible sense that permits normal
speech to occur, without being nonsense (Unsinn). (VP:102/
SP:91 )

That Husserl makes the distinction is beyond question: first in

#15 of the first Investigation, and again in #12 of the fourth,
Husserl insists that a locution can be meaningful even if its object
cannot be given, thus, even if it is necessarily false. "I drew a
round square" is false but intelligible: "round square" is meaning-
ful, but because of its internal contradiction there is an a priori
impossibility that the object it signifies be given. "The present
king of France is bald" is also meaningful, although there is a
present empirical impossibility that its object be given. Husserl
makes these distinctions clearly and consistently; Derrida ac-
knowledges them as Husserlian only sporadically. The distinc-
tions are intelligible, of course, only if one recognizes the ex-
pressive relation between locution and object, and, as we have
seen, Derrida generally ignores Husserl's accounts of that rela-
tion.
Derrida's occasional ignorance or ignoring of the distinction
between nonsense and absurdity makes the scope of Husserlian
logic appear severely limited. This misleading appearance is further
enhanced by a perplexing Derridian error. In #3 of the first Inves-
tigation, Husserl distinguishes proof (Beweiss from "demonstra-
tion" (Hinweis). The two are similar in that each names a "motiva-
tional" relation in which I believe what is proved or demonstrated
because of what proves or demonstrates it. Derrida takes the basis
of the distinction to be as follows: "In [the case of proof], the
'because' links together the evident and ideal necessities which
are permanent and which persist beyond every empirical hic et
nunc" (VP:30/SP:29). This suggests a peculiar logic, one in which
only necessary truths can serve as premises: if Husserl's were such
a logic, that would lend strong support to Derrida's accusation of
overweening Platonism.
Derrida attributes this logic to Husserl on the basis of a passage
 57

he quotes immediately after the above sentence: "An ideal rule is

here [i.e., in any proof] revealed which extends its sway beyond
the judgments here and now united by 'motivation'; in a supra-
empirical generality it comprehends as such all judgments having
a like content, all judgments, even, having a like form" (Hua
XIX/1, 33; LI:271). Derrida notwithstanding, Husserl does not
even suggest that the judgments - the premises and conclusion -
included in a proof need be a priori, necessary truths. For Husserl,
as for successful students o f introductory logic, the relation be-
tween premises and conclusion o f a proof is necessary and a priori;
the premises and conclusion themselves may be empirical, contin-
gent, or even false without affecting the validity o f the proof. 1~
Moreover, if we are to understand Husserl, it is essential that we
also consider an intentional - as opposed to purely logical - differ-
ence between proof and demonstration: if I posit the relation of
conclusion to premises as one of logical entailment, then I have
posited a relation of proof, even if I have made a logical error and
no proof is there. Similarly, there may be cases where I am un-
aware of a relation o f entailment that a better logician would
identify; in such a case, I may posit a problematic connection
where in fact there is a necessary one. In neither case - indeed,
in no case - does the classification o f the premises themselves as
empirical or a priori come into question.
Husserl's logical grammar is not restricted in the ways suggested
by Derrida; neither is it intended to be normative in the way Derri-
da assumes:

being interested in language only within the compass o f ration-

ality, determining the logos from logic, Husserl had, in a most
traditional manner, determined the essence of language by
taking the logical as its telos or norm. (FP: 6/SP: 8)

According to Husserl, however, language does not strive to be

logical or grammatical; language is always already logical and
grammatical: "no language is thinkable that would not be essen-
tially codetermined by this a priori" (Hua X I X / 1 , 3 4 7 ; LI: 525).
Derrida wrongly identifies Husserl's primary concern as te-
leological; in fact, it is descriptive. Husserl is concerned not with
what language should be, but with what language must be, what it
58

cannot help being. Language should not strive to free itself from
objective reference: Husserl knows, far better than most, that that
is impossible in principle, as well as undesirable. For Husserl, the
meaning of a locution is not superior to its object; but it is, in a
specific sense, prior. It is prior in that if y o u understand what I
say, then it is possible for me to inform y o u about the object o f
which I am speaking, or to remind y o u o f that object, or to direct
your attention toward that object; but if y o u do not understand
what I mean - if, for example, I speak in a language in which y o u
are not conversant - then my locution will not make y o u aware
o f its object in any way at all. The expression o f meaning is a
condition for the possibility o f the expression o f object.
In Husserlian terms: it is possible for one's intention o f the
meaning of a locution to be filled while one's intention o f the
object remains e m p t y - as would be the case, for example, if I
referred to "the victor at the battle o f Jena" in conversation with
a speaker of English who knew nothing of Jena and its military
history. The intention of the meaning must be filled for the in-
tention o f the object to arise; for that reason, what is essential
to the locution qua expression is its meaning - the meaning must
be present for the locution to function expressively - while at
the same time, in the normal case, what the locution directs our
attention toward is the object, and not the meaning. If I were
to announce to an audience that I just read that the President
of the United States had suffered a massive heart attack, members
of the audience would presumably think about whether the vic-
tim would survive - thus, about the object o f my locution, rather
than about its meaning - but they would do so only if they had
understood the meaning. ~
Husserl's pure logical grammar is, despite Derrida, not exclusive-
ly or primarily normative~3 ; nor is it applicable only to eternal
truths; nor does it presuppose that language is or can be free from
relation to objects; nor does it require that inner speech be private
language. Derrida's critique fails.
 59

§ 3. Conclusion

My argument has been completed. I have not attempted to refute

Derridian thinking (indeed, I am not sure that such "refutation,"
in any traditional sense, would be possible). Nor have I presented
a comprehensive defense of Husserlian phenomenology. I have
revealed neither that Husserl has all the answers, nor that Derrida
has none. I have argued that Derrida's analysis of the first Logical
Investigation is philosophically inadequate; at the same time, un-
fortunately, it is rhetorically devastating. In his critique, Derrida
quotes Husserl often, and at length; the critique appears to be the
product of a careful, thorough study of the text. It may also ap-
pear to be successful. In the opening sentence of his Introduction
to the English translation of Speech and Phenomena, Newton
Garver announces that "Derrida's critique of Husserl is a first-
class piece of analytical work in the philosophy of language"
(SP:ix); in the "Translator's Introduction," David Allison asserts
that Derrida offers "one of the most thorough and reflective
criticisms yet to appear on the work of Husserl" (SP:xxxi). Never-
theless, as I have attempted to show, the critique is vitiated by
inconsistent acknowledgments of some Husserlian teachings, and
by clear misinterpretations of others. These defects can become
visible, of course, only to those who spend time with the Husserl-
ian text.
Derrida has, quite obviously, read Husserl; but how many have
read - and been convinced by - Derrida on Husserl without
having read Husserl at all? How many who have read Derrida on
Bataille on Hegel have struggled with either Hegel or Bataille?
Those who read Derrida with admiration are not, I fear, encour-
aged to spend time with the texts he discusses. 14 Despite all the
similarities between Derrida and the later Heidegger, this points
to a great and serious difference: Heidegger's message to those
sympathetic to him is that they must study the history of phi-
losophy with the greatest of care. Heidegger maintained a pro-
found respect for the tradition even while reacting against it;
he forces his followers to confirm his teachings for themselves.
Derrida seems to lead his followers away from the tradition, at
least from the parts of the tradition that he himself has already
"deconstructed." And those who are led away from the tradition
60

in this fashion forfeit the opportunity o f learning from it. Stu-

dents of Derrida may o f course return to other traditional texts
in order to "deconstruct" them, but that is no true return. Phi-
losophical texts are vital, and are instructive in the most serious
sense, only if one approaches them free from the presuppositions
that they are "metaphysical," that they therefore belong within
a history that is "closed," and that they must therefore be based
in a "faith in the founding value o f presence," a faith and a value
and a presence one somehow understands even before opening
the books.
Nearly one hundred and fifty years ago, in a much different
historical and ideological context, Schelling issued a warning
against "premature terminations o f philosophy and the swaggering
that accompanies them". 15 Judging on the basis o f Speech and
Phenomena, I suggest that Derrida's termination remains prema-
ture.

Notes

1. My thanks to Pierre Adler, Thomas Seebohm, and Robert Sokolowski,

whose comments on earlier versions of this paper revealed to me the errors
of at least some of my ways.
2. Jacques Derrida, La voix et le ph~nomtne (Paris: Presses Universitaires
de France, 1967), p. 115. English translation (which I use throughout):
Speech and Phenomena and Other Essays on Husserl's Theory of Signs,
trans. David B. Allison (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1973),
pp, 1 0 2 - 0 3 . Henceforth cited parenthetically as VP (French), SP (En-
gush).
3. See pp. 4 7 - 4 8 below for references.
4. This is my paraphrase of the argument in Derrida's "Introduction."
Derrida stresses the importance of presence and fullness for Husserl on
VP:3[SP:5, adding ideality, permanence (repeatability), and identity on
VP:4/SP:6, rationality on VP:6/SP:8, and clarity on VP:8/SP'9. The
claim that Husserl identifies the "telos" or " n o r m " of language with be-
ing as presence is made on VP:6/SP:8, the identification of phenome-
nology as "the metaphysics of presence in the form of ideality" on
VP:9]SP:IO. Derrida announces on VP:5/SP:6-7 that he will lead us to
"recognize an irreducible nonpresenee as having a constituting value,
and with it a nonlife, a nonpresence or nonself-belonging of the living
present, an ineradicable nonprimordiality," and hints on VP: 15/SP: 15
that his analysis will undermine Husserl by introducing "nonpresence and
 61

difference (mediation, signs, referral back, etc.) in the heart of self-

presence." Much later, Derrida concludes:
We have experienced the systematic interdependence of the con-
cepts of sense, ideality, objectivity, truth, intuition, perception, and
expression. Their common matrix is being as presence: the absolute
proximity of self-identity, the being-in-front of the object available
for repetition, the maintenance of the temporal present, whose ideal
form is the self-presence of transcendental life, whose ideal identity
allows idealiter of infinite repetition. The living present, a concept
that cannot be broken down into a subject and an attribute, is thus
the conceptual foundation of phenomenology as metaphysics. (VP:
11 I/SP:99)
5. J.N. Mohanty, Husserl's Theory of Meaning(The Hague: Nijhoff, 1964),
p. 16.
6. To avoid confusion, I use "locution" rather than "expression" for Hus-
serl's Ausdruck, saving "express," "expression" for forms of ausdrficken.
The potential for confusion would be present, for example, in the asser-
tion that in some cases expressions (Ausdrficke) fail to express (ausd~ck-
en) anything without thereby ceasing to be expressions. The apparent
paradox is avoided in the assertion that locutions may succeed or fail in
expressing.
7. J.N. Mohanty, Frege and Husserl (Bloomington: Indiana University
Press, 1982).
8. Much later in Speech and Phenomena (Chapter 7), Derrida clearly recog-
nizes that I-Iusserl makes the distinction between meaning and object:
"We know that the act of meaning, the act that confers Bedeutung
(Bedeutungsintention), is always the aim of a relation with an object"
( VP: 1O0/SP:90).
9. Hua XIX/I, 46. English translation: Logical Investigations, trans. J.N.
Findlay (New York: Humanities Press, 1970), p. 282. Cited parenthet-
ically as Hua (Husserliana, German), LI (English).
10. Whether the object can be brought to full presence is here irrelevant; for
Husserl, certain kinds of objects can be brought to full presence, others
cannot; but with all, we can distinguish degrees of presence and absence,
and therefore of clarity or vagueness of intentional acts.
11. What is perplexing about this error is that Derrida could accuse Husserl
of making such an elementary logical mistake. Bernard Flynn has sug-
gested to me that by "evident and ideal necessities" Derrida may be re-
ferring to the ideality that, for Husserl, accrues to all meanings. I do not
see how that avoids the problem, for two reasons: (1) for Husserl, all
meanings are ideal, but not all are "necessities." (2) The components of
proofs and of "demonstrations" are ideal in precisely the same way, so
mention of this ideality does not distinguish between the two; the pur-
pose of Derrida's remark is to specify just that distinction.
12. There are additional problems with occasional expressions, such as per-
62

sonal pronouns. I find Husserl's own account of these in the Investiga-

tions inconsistent, but it can, I believe, be repaired. If one argues that
the meanings of personal pronouns remain the same while their objects
vary, one avoids both the Husseflian inconsistencies and the Derridian
objections.
13. Husserl's logical grammar is normative for the theoretical language of
science, but not for ordinary language, as Derrida would have it. What
Hussed calls "the a priori laws of authentic thinking and authentic ex-
pression" also serve as norms for "merely opinion-forming, inauthentic
thought and expression" (Hua XIX/2, 7 2 7 ; L I : 8 2 9 ) ; but these normative
laws are not the pure logico-grammatical laws that are the concern of
Derrida.
14. This fear has been reinforced by responses to my arguments in this
paper. The paper has been read by three who are sympathetic to Der-
rida; all deemed it unfair to him - two quite emotionally - but all
reached this conclusion without bothering to crack the Logical Investiga-
tions.
15. F.W.J. Schelling, Philosophie der Offenbarung (Stuttgart and Augsburg;
J.G. Cotta'scher Verlag, 1858; reprint ed., Darmstadt; Wissenschaftliche
Buchgesellschaft, 1974), Vol. II, p. 293.