Act 1: The Context (1971)

The first part of this work, under the pretext of a play in three “acts,” looks at three key moments in Derrida’s confrontation with and development of John Austin’s speech act theory, all three acts taking place, curiously, as if by accident, in Montreal, that is, all three based on public presentations in Montreal that were subsequently published. This first chapter (or “act) in this “play,” titled “Derrida in Montreal (A Play in Three Speech Acts),” follows Derrida as he delivers in August 1971 in Montreal the lecture “Signature Event Context,” the first and most decisive work on speech act theory in Derrida’s corpus. Particular attention is here paid to themes such as presence, intention, repetition, power, and the opposition between speech and writing, themes that are continuous with Derrida’s works prior to 1971 but that, in the context of a rethinking of speech act theory, begin to take on new forms and move in new directions.