"So who’s the fetishist, then?" : language and idiom in Derridean hauntology and Marxist (de)ontology

Abstract

I would like to start this paper with an anecdote which, I believe, puts into perspective the differences in the discourse of Karl Marx and Jacques Derrida. The anecdote centres on the plenary address delivered by Derrida at the conference on the subject of "Applied Deconstruction" organised by the University of Luton in the summer of 1995. Luton was at the time being assailed by outbreaks of rioting, so that it was with some misgivings that delegates noticed that the conference hall, on the occasion of Derrida's plenary, had been infiltrated by a number of characters whose appearance was the very signifier of Che Guevara-inspired revolutionariness: bearded, fatigues-attired types obviously imbued with an overpowering sense of mission. Discreet efforts to exclude the infiltrators failed, but initial disquiet concerning the nature of their mission was quelled when it was noticed that they were listening with exemplary attention lo Derrida, whose talk centred on the themes of his book Specters of Marx. [excerpt]