The Big Names in Deconstruction
Jackie D is to deconstruction what Freud is to psychoanalysis: the founding father. The guiding light. Always and forever, Amen.
That said, other big names have made their mark—or, to get all Derridean on you, left their trace—as well. So if you say capital-D "Deconstruction" to a critic who was around during the movement's heyday, they're likely to think not only of Derrida himself, but also of his followers. (Deconstruction's detractors would call them his hangers-on. Ouch.)
As in any clique of theorists, these folks have had their disagreements—both with the school's founder and with each other. But more on those later, in our "Key Debates" Section.
We suggest that you think of Paul de Man as deconstruction's other Main Man. (Teehee.) Born in Belgium, de Man became famous in the States as a fiercely demanding teacher and a supremely sharp reader and difficult critic. Later, some of de Man's dirty, dirty laundry was aired, and these revelations dealt a blow to deconstruction's already iffy reputation. (See our "Timeline" for the skinny.)
Others associated with the deconstruction movement—that came to be called the Yale School, a virtual synonym for lit crit à la Derrida—include these smarty-pants profs and near-contemporaries of Derrida and de Man: Geoffrey Hartman, J. Hillis Miller, and Harold Bloom.
Together, Team D&D (Derrida and de Man) trained a younger generation of U.S.-based critics who deserve credit for putting deconstruction on the map and keeping it there. These folks proved themselves under the scarily watchful eyes of the Masters, and that's no easy feat. So props to Barbara Johnson, Avital Ronell, and Gayatri Spivak.
And all the other deconstructionist divas who keep it real.