Nebulae of Discourse
Interpretation, Textuality, and the Subject
Published on 1. October 1997
Book
Paperback/Softback
213 pages
978-3-631-31903-1 (ISBN)
Description
Nebulae of Discourse takes its inspiration from Peirce's philosophy, but merges its horizon with that of current critical theory, as well as confronts certain issues posed by post-Heideggerian hermeneutics. Its principal themes include the nebular nature of texts and of human subjectivity, questions of textual boundaries and limits, and interpretation construed as an ontological category. The book proposes a methodology which explores terrain feared by hermeneutics, but at the same time advocates a need for methodological rigour defied by deconstructive trends in post-structuralism. Unlike hermeneutics, this methodology recognizes the fact that there is no non-discursive reality; unlike deconstruction, it refuses to rely on the innocence of praxis without theory. The conditions of possibility of contemporary discourse themselves require conditions of possibility: an infrastructure of discursive mechanisms, of signs and semioses that allow specific practices to take place and to be meaningful. It is this fundamental, rudimentary infrastructure that constitutes the book's main focus.
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Person
The Author: Wojciech H. Kalaga is Professor of Literary Theory and English Literature, and Director of the Institute of British and American Culture and Literature at the University of Silesia, Poland. He lectured and conducted research at different universities, including Yale University, University of Mannheim, University of Queensland, and Murdoch University, where he was Chair of English and Comparative Literature. His publications include The Mental Landscape (on Beckett's fiction), The Literary Sign, as well as numerous articles on literary theory and semiotics. He is also editor of several collective volumes (including Discourses/Texts/Contexts and Sign/Text/Fiction) and co-founder of the ER(R)GO seminar.
Content
Contents: The principal themes of Nebulae of Discourse include the nebular nature of texts and of human subjectivity, questions of textual boundaries and limits, and interpretation construed as an ontological category.