Poststructuralism and Deconstruction as Forms of (Linguistic) Idealism

The British academic and literary critic Catherine Belsey wrote a book called Poststructuralism: A Very Short Introduction. That book doesn’t mention either (historical) idealism or (20th century) linguistic idealism. Perhaps Belsey would have seen such a mention as being out of place in an introductory book. However, this essay argues that linguistic idealism is at the very heart of poststructuralism. Indeed, Belsey’s own (very positive) words about poststructuralism show that to be the case.