Abstract

"There is no purely and rigorously phonetic writing,"2 proclaims Jacques Derrida as he coins the term différance. The a in différance is not audible; the difference is purely graphic, and when expressed orally the hearer understands différence whether it is written with an e or an a. But Derrida is working in French, and while it is clear that French is not purely and rigorously phonetic in its writing, this does not necessarily hold for other languages or linguistic scripts, nor does the silence of différance necessarily survive translation. Moreover, especially if one considers Derrida's more generalized definition of "writing"—not only as marks on a surface, but as a sign system—then a natural counter-example of...