What topics did Derrida examine in Of Grammatology, Writing and Difference, and Speech and Phenomena?

In his seminal 1967 works—Of Grammatology, Writing and Difference, and Speech and Phenomena—Jacques Derrida examined the history of Western philosophy through the lens of deconstruction.12

These texts focus on the following core themes:

• Metaphysics of Presence: Derrida critiqued the pervasive Western philosophical tendency to prioritize concepts like unity, essence, and identity, which assume that truth and reality can be fully "present" to the mind.32
• Binary Oppositions: He analyzed hierarchical dualities—such as speech/writing, nature/culture, and mind/body—where one term is traditionally privileged over the other. He argued that these oppositions are not natural but are "constructions" within texts.312
• The Speech/Writing Hierarchy: Derrida challenged the assumption that speech is a more authentic, "present" form of language than writing. He demonstrated that speech itself relies on characteristics traditionally assigned to writing, such as absence and the possibility of misunderstanding.31
• Différance: He introduced this term to explain how meaning is never fixed or fully present but is instead endlessly deferred through an infinite chain of linguistic differences.312

Derrida explored these topics by engaging with the works of seminal figures, including Edmund Husserl, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and Sigmund Freud.1