In the Exergue, Derrida presents three quotations that set the tone for the entire work. These quotes establish Derrida’s focus on dismantling ethnocentrism, which he argues is closely related to logocentrism and phonocentrism. Derrida proposes that history has privileged speech over writing, and this phonocentrism has profoundly affected philosophy, metaphysics, and science.

Derrida suggests that writing about language is difficult because the only medium available to do so is language itself.

The Program

For centuries prior to Derrida’s work, speech dominated the hierarchical binary of the oral word and written language. In this binary, writing serves merely to assist the communication of speech. The written word is a direct reference to spoken language. Speech holds this superior place because it is considered closer to thought. An individual thinks and speaks in tandem, and the listener receives this intimate form of language by listening. This philosophical view portrays writing as “the signifier of the signifier” (7), meaning that words on a page, rather than representing the signified, represent the spoken word.

However, Derrida argues that this hierarchy is shifting, and the written word is establishing itself as a singular signifier.