수브젝틸(Subjectile)

The Subjectile: Derrida's Theory of the Subject

Regarding the recent discussion on the subject, Derrida addresses the question of posthumanism more specifically in "The Ends of Man," "Eating Well," "To Unsense the Subjectile," and The Animal that therefore I am as an extension of his major themes such as differance, trace, supplement, etc. He even deconstructs Heidegger because the latter also posited human beings in his ontology or onto-theological structure although he tried to negate traditional humanism which ultimately partakes of transcendental metaphysics. Derrida claims that his posthumanism is geared with the difference, the trace of otherness not pursuing the origin of being. However, he denies advocating the idea of liquidating humans literally; rather he advances the exappropriation and reappropriation of the subject. Exappropriation is to create distance from the self-identity and to be besieged by the problematics of differences. Reappropriation is to reinstate the subject in opposed and multiple directions. Furthermore, quoting the subjectile from Antonin Artaud Derrida proposes it as his new concept and disseminates many other notions from it such as projection, introjection, abjection, etc. Largely he divides the subjectile into two categories: being thrown and throwing. The subjectile as thrown is focused on the inertia and passivity of the subject; thus it could be failure, a cadaver or soil, damaged, destroyed, and persecuted. On the other hand, it can be made into more progressive and energetic elements such as receptacle or womb. The subjectile as a projectile gains an excessive energy and can unveil into a missile that can be displaced into violent effects, such as ghosts. Thus, it can disjoint the insistence on essentialism or substantialism exploding substratum and representation. Derrida differentiates his subject not only to strangers but also onto the animal radicalizing the notion of the other. Defying traditional biology in which human subjects observe animals, he transfers human beings' attention to the fact that animals can gaze at humans too. At that point encountering the entire difference we come to cross the boundary between man and animal and produce heterogeneous multiplicity. In addition, Derrida asserts that the animal means to become an autobiographical animal which allows for writing at once about the self and another's history.