Disorder of Things

While there may be a certain sense in which it is understood that poststructuralism and postmodernism are not the same, nevertheless discussions of the latter continue to abound at the expense of much direct consideration of poststructuralism as a legitimate enterprise in its own right. Certainly there have been some attempts to distinguish between these two versions of ‘the post’ (see for example Lucy, Postmodern Literary Theory: An Introduction) but as yet no single work exists in which poststructuralism is discussed ‘in itself’ (leaving aside for now the question of whether it has an ‘itself’) rather than in terms of being postmodernism’s supplement or the wilful but misguided enemy of the analytical tradition.

Part of the reason that poststructuralism has been neglected has to do with a perception of postmodernism’s openness, to the extent that no particular disciplinary training is thought to be required either to comment on it or to do it. This is no doubt why postmodernism has appealed strongly to Cultural Studies, where the self-interest of a ‘new’ discipline is well served by appearing to be counter-traditional and, in a sense, anti-disciplinary. At the same time poststructuralism is associated strongly with the discipline of philosophy, being seen therefore as somewhat forbidding if not also, in terms of social agendas, irrelevant.

Whatever its reputation, poststructuralism continues to be referred to in books and papers, in lecture theatres and conferences. In this way it remains a question, such that there is clearly a need for a book-length introduction to the question of what poststructuralism ‘is’.