The truth (and untruth) of language : Heidegger, Ricoeur, and Derrida on disclosure and displacement

 by Gerrit Jan Van Der Heiden. This book investigates the relationship between language and truth/untruth through analysis of contemporary hermeneutic theory in the thought of Heidegger, Ricoeur, and Derrida. Van der Heiden (Radboud Univ. Nijmegen, the Netherlands) suggests that much of the history of philosophy attempts to eliminate ambiguity by reducing language to a universal and transparent system. Hermeneutics, on the other hand, stresses the importance of metaphor, poetics, and translation. The author focuses on points of agreement between hermeneutic and deconstructive theories to argue for the roles of disclosure and displacement in the function of language. Disclosure is the relationship between language and being and truth as most clearly seen in Heidegger; displacement involves linguistic phenomena such as metaphor, translation, and mimesis that displace "a word or a group of words from one (con)text to another." Chapter 1 sets the stage through a discussion of Heidegger's notions of truth, untruth, understanding, and language. The following three chapters address the themes of writing, metaphor, and mimesis and their relationship to disclosure and displacement. The final chapter provides a more direct investigation of these two thematic terms. Summing Up: Recommended. --Choice (Check catalog)