The Yale Critics: Deconstruction in America, and: On Deconstruction: Theory and Criticism After Structuralism, and: Deconstructive Criticism: An Advanced Introduction., and: Deconstruction: Theory and Practice (review)

208 the minnesota review the narrative voice, changes — from chapter tochapter, even within chapters. I consider this to be one of its strengths. In this context, strength is defined not in the polemic sense of aility to stand one's ground, but in the psychoanalytic sense of capacity for change, flexibility " (p. xi). This strategy is consistent with the rest of the book, and must be respected; yet I think it is not unreasonable to ask that she retain, not aU the variations which her writing might have recorded, but only those which put issues usefully into play for the reader. There are, certainly, feminist questions to be posed to Gallop: is it really necessary to accept the conventional French feminist castigation of traditional feminism as masculine? Does acknowledging it as a difficulty neutralize the privilege accorded heterosexuality as a metaphor for the abUity to encounter alterity? But most importantly we need to ask if this tendency is a productive one for feminism and feminist critidsm. Are we reaUy in such a dosed circle—is there no way to undermine "patriarchal positions" but "wearfing them] out" (p. 55)? GaUop has provided a brilUant account of a school of thought which is clearly going to be part of feminist discussions, in the academy at least, for some time, and she exemplifies a method of reading which has much to offer. But I find myself wondering what can be achieved by a feminism which manifests itsdf primarily as a strategy ofwriting, as a way of hoUowing out locations for momentary resistance within an admittedly phallocentric system. WhUe 7Ae Daughter's Seduction is in many ways the most accomplished of the three books under review here, its direction seems to me the least promising. JUNE HOWARE The Yale Critics: Deconstruction in America. Eds. Jonathan Arac, Wlad Godzdch, and Wallace Martin. Theory and History of Literature, Vol. 6. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1983. Pp. xUi + 222. $12.95 (paper); $29.50 (doth). Jonathan Culler. On Deconstruction: Theory and Criticism After Structuralism. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1982. Pp. 307. $8.95 (paper); $22.50 (doth). Vincent B. Leitch. Deconstructive Criticism: An Advanced Introduction. New York: Columbia University Press, 1983. Pp. xUi + 290. $9.50 (paper); $25 (doth). Christoper Norris. Deconstruction: Theory and Practice. London and New York: Methuen, 1982. Pp. xhi + 157. $7.95 (paper); $13.95 (doth). The books under discussion here are perhaps less significant in thdr own right than as symptoms of a larger trend: the current academic boom in "deconstruction." The writings ofJacques Derrida in France, and ofthe late Paul de Man and others in America, have now been supplemented by Culler's, Ldtch's, and Norris's introductions to deconstruction for the general academic reader, and by Arac et al.'s coUection of essays devoted to the "Yale Critics." These books all cover pretty much the same ground. Culler's is by far the most detailed and rigorous ofthe three introductions; Norris offers a briefer and more polemical summary; Ldtch goes beyond the bounds of strict "deconstruction" to discuss a greater number of French and American critics. The essays in the "Yale Critics" anthology provide a stiU wider variety of perspectives, ranging from extensions of deconstructionist methodology to acerbic attacks (the latter most notably in Stanley Corngold's "Error in Paul de Man," 90-108). In dicussing aU these volumes, my emphasis will fall upon what Wlad Godzich rightly caUs "The Domestication of Derrida" (Arac, 20-40). This process, explicitly reflected upon in the "Yale Critics" coUection, is presupposed by the very existence of the three introductions . For the most part, these books do not engage in any new theoretical work. They summarize articles by Derrida, de Man, and other deconstructionists, and attempt to justify thdr methodologies. Such endeavors are extremely useful when (as is especially the case with Culler) they are done well. But beyond the individual emphases ofthese volumes, they aU bear witness to the successful assimilation of deconstruction within the Anglo-American academy.1 reviews 209 The institutionalization of deconstruction, at Yale and other American universities, has only been furthered by furious traditionalist attacks, since they help to legitimize deconstruction as a topic for debate. In...