poststructuralism

Poststructuralism is a broad intellectual movement that emerged in the late 1960s in France as a critical response to structuralism. It emphasizes the instability of meanings, critiques fixed binary oppositions, and questions the existence of universally valid structures governing language, culture, and society.

Its core claim is that language is not a transparent medium for representing an objective world but a system of signs whose meanings are deferred and shaped by social, historical, and textual contexts. Poststructuralists challenge the idea of a stable authorial intention, arguing that texts generate meaning through difference and interpretation rather than through a single, determinate message. Deconstruction, associated with Jacques Derrida, analyzes how texts undermine their own claims by revealing internal contradictions and hierarchies of value.

Key figures include Michel Foucault, who traced how knowledge and power circulate through discourses; Roland Barthes, who declared the death of the author and emphasized readerly versus writerly texts; Julia Kristeva, with her notion of intertextuality; and Jean-François Lyotard, who questioned metanarratives. Other influential voices include Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari and Jacques Lacan, whose psychoanalytic theorizing about language and subjectivity informed poststructural critiques.

Poststructuralism has influenced literary criticism, philosophy, cultural studies, anthropology, gender studies, and art theory by focusing on power relations, discourse, and the instability of meaning. It often involves close reading, genealogical critique, and discourse analysis to reveal how knowledge is constructed and how identities are formed.

Critics argue that poststructuralism can verge on relativism and political inaction, and some have resisted its rejection of objective truth. Nevertheless, it remains a foundational influence in contemporary humanities, contributing to ongoing debates about authorship, authority, culture, and the nature of interpretation.