The Elusive Sign: Derrida, Tradition, and the Question of Meaning

Introduction

Few concepts have exercised such enduring influence over the history of philosophy and linguistics as the sign. From Aristotle’s On Interpretation to Saussure’s Course in General Linguistics, the sign has been treated as a bridge between thought, language, and reality. Yet Jacques Derrida’s deconstruction in Of Grammatology demonstrates that this apparently stable structure is undermined by its own assumptions. By interrogating the metaphysical commitments underlying the sign, Derrida exposes the fragility of notions such as origin, transcendental signified, and logocentrism. This article explores Derrida’s critique in relation to classical and modern accounts of the sign, focusing on Aristotle, Augustine, Jakobson, and Saussure, and culminating in Derrida’s own proposal of arche-writing.

The Classical Foundations: Aristotle and Augustine

The Western tradition of the sign begins with Aristotle’s Περὶ Ἑρμηνείας (On Interpretation). For Aristotle, signs mediate between the world, the soul, and linguistic expression:

“Now spoken sounds are symbols of affections in the soul, and written marks symbols of spoken sounds. And just as written marks are not the same for all men, neither are spoken sounds. But what these are in the first place signs of – affections of the soul – are the same for all; and what these affections are likenesses of – actual things – are also the same.” (Aristotle, On Interpretation, 16a3–8)

Here, we find an origin model: reality imprints itself on the soul as universal “affections,” which speech then expresses, and writing subsequently represents. Speech is thus privileged as the most immediate link between inner thought and external reality, relegating writing to a secondary, derivative status.

Augustine develops a similar framework in De Dialectica. A sign, he writes, is:

“quod se ipsum sensui, et praeter se aliquid animo ostendit” — “something that shows itself to the senses and something other than itself to the mind.” (Augustine, De Dialectica)

For Augustine, signs point beyond themselves, bringing together the sensible and the intelligible. This reinforces the hierarchical model: signs serve as conduits, leading the mind from perceptible reality toward intelligible truth. The underlying assumption remains that meaning originates in a stable realm beyond language itself.

Structuralism and Its Metaphysical Residues

Centuries later, structuralist linguistics reformulated the concept of the sign while appearing to break from metaphysics. Roman Jakobson, building on Saussure, reaffirmed this bipartite structure:

“Every linguistic unit is bipartite and involves both aspects — one sensible and the other intelligible, or in other words, both the signans ‘signifier’ (Saussure’s signifiant) and the signatum ‘signified’ (signifié). These two constituents of a linguistic sign (and of sign in general) necessarily suppose and require each other.” (Jakobson, 1963, cited in Derrida, Of Grammatology)

While structuralism emphasized the relational and differential character of signs, Derrida argues that it did not escape metaphysics. The very division between signifier and signified presupposes a transcendental signified — some conceptual content that stabilizes the signifier. Even in structuralism, then, the dream of presence and origin persists.

Derrida’s Deconstruction: Arche-Writing and Différance

Derrida dismantles this hierarchy by introducing the concept of arche-writing: a primordial textuality that precedes both speech and writing. As he insists,

“There is no linguistic sign before writing.” (Of Grammatology, p. 14)

This provocative claim overturns the assumption that writing is secondary. For Derrida, writing is the condition of possibility for signification itself. Speech no longer occupies the privileged position of immediacy; instead, both speech and writing are caught within a broader system of textuality.

This leads directly to his critique of the transcendental signified. If meaning were grounded in a stable origin (truth, God, justice, presence), then language could secure reference. But Derrida shows that every sign refers not to a fixed essence but to another sign, in a perpetual chain of différance — his neologism capturing both deferral and difference. Meaning is always postponed, never fully present.

The word “God,” for instance, might seem to denote a stable, transcendent being. Yet, as Derrida observes, its meaning is endlessly mediated by cultural, historical, and linguistic contexts. Similarly, “justice” resists closure: it shifts across legal, political, and philosophical discourses, never attaining definitive form. In both cases, the supposed transcendental signified dissolves into an infinite play of interpretations.

Logocentrism, Phonocentrism, and the Critique of Presence

At the core of Derrida’s argument lies the concept of logocentrism — the Western tendency to privilege logos as the source of truth and presence. This is closely tied to phonocentrism, the belief that speech brings us closer to meaning than writing. As Derrida puts it:

“The essence of the phone would be immediately proximate to that which within ‘thought’ as logos relates to ‘meaning,’ produces it, receives it, speaks it, ‘composes’ it.” (Of Grammatology)

From Aristotle to Husserl, this assumption recurs: the voice is thought to provide access to presence, while writing is considered an external, secondary representation. Derrida destabilizes this binary by showing that both speech and writing are equally implicated in the play of signifiers. No privileged origin or immediacy grounds meaning.

Conclusion

The history of the sign, from Aristotle’s “affections of the soul” to Saussure’s structuralism, has been bound to the metaphysical quest for origin and presence. Derrida’s intervention reveals that this quest rests on unstable ground. By dismantling the hierarchy of speech over writing, and by rejecting the transcendental signified, Derrida reconfigures language as an endless play of différance, where meaning is never secured but always deferred.

In this light, the sign is not a transparent bridge between thought and reality but a restless network of traces, forever resisting closure. To speak of origin or stable meaning is, in this view, an act of vanity — a metaphysical desire for certainty where only difference prevails.

References

• Aristotle. (1993). On Interpretation (Περὶ Ἑρμηνείας) (J. L. Ackrill, Trans.). Clarendon Press.
• Augustine. (1975). De Dialectica. In On Dialectic (J. P. Smith, Trans.). Catholic University of America Press.
• Derrida, J. (1997). Of Grammatology (G. C. Spivak, Trans.). Johns Hopkins University Press. (Original work published 1967)
• Jakobson, R. (1963). Essais de linguistique générale. Paris: Éditions de Minuit.
• Saussure, F. de. (2011). Course in General Linguistics (P. Meisel & H. Saussy, Eds.; W. Baskin, Trans.). Columbia University Press. (Original work published 1916)