The "Tao" and the "Logos": Notes on Derrida's Critique of Logocentrism

Abstract

an advantage when a language possesses an abundance of logical expressions, that is, specific and separate expressions for thought determinations themselves; prepositions and articles denote relationships based on thought. So Hegel declares ex cathedra in his preface to second edition of Science of Logic. The Chinese language, philosopher continues with unjustified assurance, is supposed not to have developed to this stage or only to an inadequate extent; he then exalts German for having many advantages over other modern languages; some of its words even possess further peculiarity of having not only different but opposite meanings.' It seems that a tradition exists in West that readily recognizes superiority of German as a medium for philosophy. Martin Heidegger, for instance, maintains that German, along with Greek, is (in regard to its possibilities for thought) at once most powerful and most spiritual of all languages.2 For Hegel, advantage of a logical language shown by its prepositions and articles; so he can ignore Chinese language precisely because Chinese has few prepositions, as compared with German, and no articles at all. Logical and grammatical relations are indicated in Chinese mainly by word order, without recourse to any change of sound or form in words themselves. It interesting to note that while Hegel considers this lack of inflection in Chinese to be a defect, Ernst Cassirer regards it as the only truly adequate means of expressing grammatical relations. For it would seem possible to designate them more clearly and specifically as relations pure and simple, possessing no perceptual base of their own, through