Meaning Elicitation Tactics in Jacques Derrida and Abd al-Qahir al-Jurjani: A Comparative Critique

The current research paper centers basically around two prominent theorists in the critical arena, a modern Westerner and an ancient Easterner. These are the French, Algerian-born philosopher, Jacques Derrida (1930-2004), and the Medieval Muslim scholar of Persian origins and rhetorician, Abd al-Qahir al-Jurjani (1009-1078). The main effort here is particularly focused on the former’s theory of deconstruction and the latter’s concept of nazm. Two reference books are deliberately selected for the study: Derrida’s Of Grammatology (2016) and al-Jurjani’s Dalail al-I’jaz (2004 [The Rationale behind the Inimitability of the Quran]). In spite of the huge gaps of time, let alone the cultural differences that separate the two thinkers, a close reading of their texts, already mentioned, reveals that there are many similarities linking the two together. Derrida and al-Jurjani, alike, elaborate on skillful tactics for reading a literary piece in terms of its linguistic structure or context. Derrida’s deconstruction represents a singular act of reading, that concentrates on studying the structure of ‘reference’ within a ‘sign-system’. Al-Jurjani’s nazm is a collective method of reading that tends to illuminate the ‘semantic-syntactic’ fabric of ‘discourse’. In order to highlight the linguistic structure of a literary text, Derrida and Al-Jurjani suggest that the very function of literary criticism is to urge the readers to contemplate the causal relationship between a ‘sign’ and its ‘signified’ message. Regardless of their different critical methodology, both theorists have an identical aesthetic project, that enables critics to treat the literary text, as if it were a linguistic ‘code’ between the author (sender) and the reader (recipient).