The Structural Allegory

Reconstructive Encounters with the New French Thought

1984

John Fekete, editor
Introduction by John Fekete

“An impressive testament to the scope, substantiality, energy, and fertility of contemporary ‘post-structuralist’ theoretical activity. The volume is simultaneously an annunciation, incarnation, chronicle, and critique of one of the central intellectual movements of our time. What gives the collection its significance are both the sophistication and originality of the individual pieces and also their double-edged convergent conclusion: namely, that while ‘the structural allegory’ - or the use of a ‘language paradigm’ for the analysis of human thought, culture and life - has been of revolutionary intellectual import, its implications of social-political ‘praxis’ appear to be incoherent, pessimistic, nihilistic, paralyzing, or, at the least, impotent.” --Barbara Herrnstein Smith, University of Pennsylvania

John Fekete is professor of English and cultural studies at Trent University in Canada and the author of The Critical Twilight.

“An impressive testament to the scope, substantiality, energy, and fertility of contemporary ‘post-structuralist’ theoretical activity. The volume is simultaneously an annunciation, incarnation, chronicle, and critique of one of the central intellectual movements of our time. What gives the collection its significance are both the sophistication and originality of the individual pieces and also their double-edged convergent conclusion: namely, that while ‘the structural allegory’ - or the use of a ‘language paradigm’ for the analysis of human thought, culture and life - has been of revolutionary intellectual import, its implications of social-political ‘praxis’ appear to be incoherent, pessimistic, nihilistic, paralyzing, or, at the least, impotent.” --Barbara Herrnstein Smith, University of Pennsylvania