ABSTRACT
This chapter shows the work of Deconstruction is not a clear methodology or approach that gets us nearer to things. Deconstruction is the work of American Studies as an academic subject to make itself and its objects strange, unstable, and difficult; to undo the very meaning-making structures one operate in. Structuralism originates as a method of linguistics developed by Ferdinand de Saussure in the early twentieth century. In as much as the idea of universality should now feel stranger to you, you might also begin to get a feeling of how the deconstructive critique of dominant systems works. Derrida was providing analytical tools to deconstruct the privileging structures of metaphysical logo centrism in the 1970s, political activists, academic study groups, and social protesters were working to dismantle structural privileges within the academy, the exclusionary practices of capitalist and patriarchal society, and of US imperialism.
