Double Movements in Poststructuralism: Hoy and The Idea of Home

       David Hoy’s "Foucault and Critical Theory" brings to mind common questions of poststructuralist thought that frequently ask of an apparent contradiction that inhabits such new theoretical terrain: how can constructs of language/meaning/knowledge be critiqued with (merely) more constructs of the same? Hoy likens reality constructs to webs and argues that while poststructuralist webs seem to be allowing us to objectively analyze (or to see the deconstruction of) other webs, we are nevertheless still trapped on a web. In effect, what Hoy seems to be suggesting is that "true" or "complete" poststructuralist webs would have to destroy (or critique) themselves as well as other webs. This critique of Foucault and recent critical theory, however, fails to acknowledge both the ability of poststructuralism to keep webs (including itself) from "solidifying" (or becoming constraining) and poststructuralism’s analysis of the often counterproductive use of binary oppositions. (Not all webs are equal.) Indeed, I would argue that Hoy builds a limited, dualistic view of critical theory, a view that suggests we are "trapped" (as opposed to being poststructurally "free") by linguistic constructs. To peer at how theoretical webs might allow us to perform double movements—ones using language to critique language—we might look to three texts: Jonathan Culler’s "Literary Theory"; Henry Louis Gates’s "'Ethnic and Minority' Studies"; and Curtis White’s The Idea of Home.

       Culler, in discussing recent turns in critical theory, realizes that "[a] theoretical account of political forces is itself also part of that field of forces, a political event or intervention; a philosophical theory of metaphor does not escape metaphoricity." (213) Hence, as Lacan has argued, "there is no metalanguage." We cannot step outside of our linguistic webs to survey/tear apart/(re)build them. But neither are we trapped arachnids, for there are always gaps in any web, places where the silk is frayed, moments in arachnid time when we must rebuild by using patterns from previous structural webs. Poststructuralist thought is not a metaweb; rather, it is a series of diverse linguistic constructs that search out the inevitable gaps and frays in webs. Thus, poststructuralist processes keep our constructions of reality from becoming rigid, constraining, "natural", or autonomous.

       It might, of course, be tempting to view these new critical theories as flags signaling the end of language and meaning: if all webs are arbitrary and relative constructs, if words as categories are always essentializing, what good, objectively, is language as critique? Moreover, as Hoy argues, these flags are also arbitrary and relative constructs, webs themselves. Such spirals into self-reflexivity and paradox seem to be borne out of a dualistic view of poststructuralism. Foucault, Derrida, Barthes, Spivak, and others would contest that these new webs are hardly signals to jump from all webs into the abyss. (This metaphor is coming dangerously close to one posed by Jonathan Edwards.) We are only trapped by dualistic thinking webs, not all webs: if we assume that language is transparent; or if we presume that all language is pointless and does trap us. Gates, in an essay which studies ethnic and minority politics, posits that to somehow give up language and sign-usage as critique (to jump) would be the least productive option, obviously. He suggest that we might view "representative labels" less as signifying eternal, underlying essence and more as "articulating" useful terms, perhaps (and likely) changing these terms where value is achieved in doing so, reorganizing them slightly maybe, keeping them flexible and accepting of difference.

       We thus have come full circle to a view of poststructuralist webs entailing a double movement: language to (de)/(re)construct language; webs that remind us to keep webs flexible, perhaps even including themselves in that recommendation. If we see Curtis White’s The Idea of Home as such a network of double movements, we might examine how this textual process envelops other webs and itself. At the outset of the first chapter of the novel we are told that "there are ideas as yet unrealized which if realized would transcend our present reality" (9). Is this, then, the goal of this text? To help us "realize" these new realities, these new webs? Yes and no. The Idea of Home signifies, speaks, uses language, essentializes, creates, webs, yet the ideas, the webs, in this text seem at once impossible, rich in realistic detail, and surrealistic. The chaos and fragility of such things thus do not allow them to seem to be "answers" or perfect constructs: there is no overriding theme; all we are left with is a feeling that our webs are falling apart; barely anything fills the gaps. The "ideas" that we "realize" in reading this novel, I would argue, are hence mostly meaningless where meaning is desired. As such, their only meaning seems to be that all webs of meaning are incomplete and open for studied discussion. The idea of The Idea of Home is thus probably one that simply suggests so paradoxically that big ideas, like that of "home", can be both empty and full of promise in the sense that they are webs that call our attention to webs as artificial, temporary constructs, ones which upon close inspection show gaps and frays where new ideas may be realized that may, however White would like it them to, transcend our present webbing.

       Hoy’s critique of Foucault seems to want to close, specifically, with an either/or position on language use. According to Hoy, we can either look to our webs as perfect symbols of nature, or we can view them as completely unnatural, trapping in their incompleteness. Poststructuralism, among other things, seems to show how such binaries are often the most restrictive webs to be on. The spider always rebuilds, never ceases spinning, even as the webs fall apart.