The Occult Zone of Unknowing

In Differance, Jacques Derrida explains the significance of the term "differance" in terms of its importance in language, speech, and context. The writer goes to great lengths to make clear the fact that a difference is completely a "neither here nor there" subject. It is a process of comparing and contextualizing an idea or concept in order to come to a final understanding of its original meaning, which paradoxically cannot exist because things only exist in relation to others, as Derrida points out as he writes, "The first consequence to be drawn from this is that the signified concept is never present in itself, in an adequate presence that would refer only to itself. Every concept is necessarily and essentially inscribed in a chain or a system"(172).

Derrida often uses a slight theatre metaphor as he refers to setting the "stage" for differentiation. This raises the question of what the stage actually is upon which comparisons can be made and meaning begins to be gathered. It is a stage that is vague at best. Derrida seems to almost want readers to get lost in his hazy grey language as he writes, "It is never given in the present or to anyone. Holding back and not exposing itself, it goes beyond the order of truth on this specific point in this determined way, yet is not itself concealed, as if it were something, a mysterious being, in the occult zone of unknowing. Any exposition would expose it to disappearing as a disappearance. It would risk disappearing, thus appearing"(169). Finding a difference begins with total disconnection, and the interpreter must find significance in the separation of time and context in order to bring the two back together for the purpose of further understanding.

Derrida's riddle-like passage above serves both in function and form as the explanation of how to set the stage for difference. The difference between two things can only occur when they are utterly separated, and it seems that Derrida explains this in such a way to separate audiences from conventional logic in order to breech the realms of typical comprehension.