Binary Opposition

The idea of the binary opposition is an inherently structurally based concept based on the Western tendency to group into hierarchy. This notion derived from Saussure's work in structuralism is a tangible point of departure into the post-structural criticism that is deconstruction.
Deconstruction's relationship with structuralism is not an antithetical one, although it shares common roots in semiotics and linguistics (Eliot and Owens 133). The binary opposition is one of the key structural ideas which deconstruction rejects.
The binary opposition is the structuralist idea that acknowledges the human tendency to think in terms of opposition. For Saussure the binary opposition was the "means by which the units of language have value or meaning; each unit is defined against what it is not" (Burgass 3). With this categorization, terms and concepts tend to be associated with a positive or negative. Derrida suggests these oppositions are not only dichotomies, but also "hierarchies in miniature"(Fry 262). For example:
(+) (-)Reason PassionMan WomanSun Moon Inside OutsidePresence AbsenceSpeech Writing
The hierarchical nature of the two oppositions is cause/effect of logocentrism.
Derrida argued that these oppositions were arbitrary and inherently unstable. The structures themselves begin to overlap and clash and ultimately these structures of the text dismantle themselves from within the text. It is this process that Derrida coins deconstruction.
Although Derrida acknowledges the human tendency to think in terms of opposites, he does so in a manner that indicates the opposite of black is not white, but not-black (Fry 262). To illustrate this idea Derrida uses différance to illuminate the inherently unstable nature of language.
The unstable nature of these dichotomies can be exemplified accordingly:
Man Androgyny WomanMan Cyborg MachineAlive Zombie Dead
Immediately the deconstructive reader would realize that although there are apparent mutually excusive dichotomies in texts, there are also ideas that overlap the dichotomies existing in both, but neither, and ultimately undoing the structure system. Additionally because these dichotomies are hierarchies in miniature, invariably the positive term slips into the "wrong" category. For example, deconstructive reading of Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Bronte would indicate that while Jane assumes the activities of the traditional woman in opposition to the male characters in the novel, that her ultimate will and power identifies her as strong and not weak. The hierarchies are then upset and begin to unravel. It is important to note however, that the deconstruction of binary oppositions is not a task to endure by the reader or critic, yet the oppositions deconstruct from within the text.
Derrida himself exemplifies deconstruction with his explanation of différance, pharmakon, and through his interest with the speech/writing dichotomy.