engleski

The Relevance of Derrida's Deconstruction and Bakhtin's Theory of Speech for the Construction of Meaning in Knowledge Societies. A Contribution to Alternative Information Systems

In the age of globality the project of the conceptualization of totality is not possible without establishing a relationship between the scientific disciplines which reflect, construct and constitute it, as well as an analysis of their intertwinement and interdependency. In this paper I will evaluate the relevance of Derrida’ s deconstruction and Bakhtin’ s theory of speech for the construction of meaning in knowledge societies. I will draw attention to the fact that conscious decisions, which are less guided by ethical motives and more by political consequences, lie behind information design and the choice of language for data implementation. Hence the two issues emerge as the crucial ones: 1. the role of human activity when handling information and information systems and 2. the role of the chosen representation language, and the relationship between the author and the program language user. In a world where nothing is stable and where there is no difference between truth and illusion, the status of knowledge is necessarily changed, and there is a need to break new intellectual ground. In the context of general intellectual crisis of Western cultural and philosophical values, but also increasingly spreading doubts about the ability of science to provide answers to the problems arising from the new spirit of the time, the semiotic critique of rational science introduces the relationship between the signifier and the signified as the counterpoint to the philosophical tradition which puts the relation between the subject and the object at the focus of its analysis. This fundamental theoretical and methodological difference also yields a radically different moral and political position. The innovative quality and operational capacities of semiotics arise from the fact that it can function as « meta-language» whose focus of analysis contains the ways in which different areas of knowledge and disciplines approach their objects of study (Crowther & Mraović 2005). The manner of presentation, as Peirce points out, implies a form of interpretation arising from specific social arrangement and social relations. The symbols are arbitrary and conventional and they require the consensus of the community regarding the correct meanings. Subconscious decisions closely related to social values are involved in every discourse, including scientific discourse. Peirce (1958) believes that every sign is self-contained and capable of developing subsequent signs with related meanings from within itself. In this context, the message gains a dominant role in communication, thus becoming the totality of the communication act, and the communication event becomes the relationship between the message and the recipient of this message. In this way, the meaning becomes the interpretation of the message by the recipient by which, according to Derrida (1978), the role of the script author is blurred.

Knowledge Societies; Scientific Discourse; Information Systems

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