Writing, otherness and authorship in discourse analysis

Abstract

This article aims at discussing the relation between the concepts of writing, alterity and authorship according to the theoretical perspective of French Discourse Analysis. It is considered that the relation between subject and writing emphasizes questions that exceed the idea that writing is a mere form of representation of orality, i.e., a way of preserving it. Writing is a space of memory, a means of subjectivation and identity construction. Therefore, writing brings in itself the constituent alterity of subject. In this space of production of a subject-effect, authorship occurs under the exile of the subject, in view of the fact that there is an asymmetry between the writer and the subject produced as subjective evidence and imaginary unit. This way, based on illusions, namely those of sense evidence, sense unity and sense origin, the subject constitutes itself as an author of a text, (des)constructing memory(ies) in a constant movement between singularity and alterity.