Jacques Derrida on Seinfeld: “Deconstruction Doesn’t Produce Any Sitcom”

Jacques Der­ri­da could enjoy a good movie like any­one else. In a 2002 inter­view with TIME, he declared “I have watched The God­fa­ther 10 times. I must watch it when­ev­er it’s on.” Who could­n’t?

Cop­po­la films were one thing. Appar­ent­ly sit­coms quite anoth­er. In anoth­er 2002 inter­view, a jour­nal­ist asked the French philoso­pher whether, in so many words, decon­struc­tion shared any­thing in com­mon with Sein­feld and the ironic/parodic way it looks at the world. This was tak­ing things too far. “Decon­struc­tion, as I under­stand it,” said Der­ri­da, “does­n’t pro­duce any sit­com. If sit­com is this, and peo­ple who watch this think decon­struc­tion is this, the only advice I have to give them is just stop watch­ing sit­com, do your home­work, and read.” The cringe­wor­thy scene orig­i­nal­ly appeared in the doc­u­men­tary, Der­ri­da, direct­ed by Kir­by Dick and Amy Zier­ing Hoff­man.

via Peter B. Kauf­man 

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Philoso­pher Jacques Der­ri­da Inter­views Jazz Leg­end Ornette Cole­man: Talk Impro­vi­sa­tion, Lan­guage & Racism (1997)

Teacher Calls Jacques Derrida’s Col­lege Admis­sion Essay on Shake­speare “Quite Incom­pre­hen­si­ble” (1951)

Hear the Writ­ing of French The­o­rists Jacques Der­ri­da, Jean Bau­drillard & Roland Barthes Sung by Poet Ken­neth Gold­smith

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