Derrida, Jacques - «Hostipitality» - Journal For The Theoretical Humanities.pdf - Derrida - MKTK

A N G E L A K I

journa l of the the oretical humani tie s

v olum e 5 n umber 3 dece mber 2000

reread with you by way of an epigraph, a

long and celebrated passage from Kant.

To begin with, I will read it almost without

commentary. But in each of its words, it will

preside over the whole of this lecture and all

questions of hospitality, the historical questions –

those questions at once timeless, archaic,

modern, current, and future [ à venir ] that the

single word “hospitality” magnetizes – the histor-

ical, ethical, juridical, political, and economic

questions of hospitality.

As you have no doubt already guessed, it

is a question in Perpetual Peace of the

famous “Third Definitive Article of a Perpetual

Peace [ Dritter Definitivartikel zum ewigen

Frieden ],” 2 the title of which is: “ Das

Weltbürgerrecht soll auf Bedingungen der

allgemeinen Hospitalität eingeschränkt sein ”:

“Cosmopolitan Right shall be limited to

Conditions of Universal Hospitality.” <Already

the question of conditionality, of conditional or

unconditional hospitality, presents itself.> 3

Two words are underlined by Kant in this

title: “cosmopolitan right” [ Weltbürgerrecht :

the right of world citizens] – we are thus in the

space of right, not of morality and politics or

anything else but of a right determined in its rela-

tion to citizenship, the state, the subject of the

state, even if it is a world state – it is a question

therefore of an international right; the other

underlined word is “hospitality” [ der allge-

meinen Hospitalität , universal hospitality]. It is

a question therefore of defining the conditions of

a cosmopolitan right, of a right the terms of

which would be established by a treaty between

states, by a kind of UN charter before the fact,

and one of these conditions would be what Kant

calls universal hospitality, die allgemeine

Hospitalität .

I quote this title in German to indicate that

the word for “hospitality” is a Latin word

jacques derrida

translated by barry stocker

with forbes morlock

HOSTIPITALITY 1

( Hospitalität , a word of Latin origin, of a trou-

bled and troubling origin, a word which carries

its own contradiction incorporated into it, a Latin

word which allows itself to be parasitized by its

opposite, “hostility,” the undesirable guest

[ hôte ] 4 which it harbors as the self-contradiction

in its own body, and which we will speak of again

later).

Kant will find a German equivalent,

Wirtbarkeit (which he will put in parentheses as

the equivalent of Hospitalität ), for this Latin

word, Hospitalität , from the first sentence which

I am now going to read.

The equivalent Kant recalls is Wirtbarkeit .

Kant writes: “As in the foregoing articles, we are

concerned here not with philanthropy, but with

right [ Es ist hier … nicht von Philanthropie,

sondern vom Recht die Rede ]” (in specifying that

it is a question here of right and not philan-

thropy, Kant, of course, does not want to show

DOI: 10.1080/09697250020034706

B efore even beginning, I will read, I will

hostipitality

that this right must be misanthropic, or even an-

anthropic; it is a human right, this right to hospi-

tality – and for us it already broaches an

important question, that of the anthropological

dimension of hospitality or the right to hospital-

ity: what can be said of, indeed can one speak of,

hospitality toward the non-human, the divine, for

example, or the animal or vegetable; does one

owe hospitality, and is that the right word when

it is a question of welcoming – or being made

welcome by – the other or the stranger

[ l’étranger 5 ] as god, animal or plant, to use those

conventional categories?). In underlining that it

is a question here of right and not philanthropy,

Kant does not mean that the right of hospitality

is a-human or inhuman, but rather that, as a

right, it does not arise [ relève ] from “the love of

man as a sentimental motive.” Universal hospi-

tality arises [ relève ] from an obligation, a right,

and a duty all regulated by law; elsewhere, in the

“Elements of Ethics” which concludes his

“Doctrine of Virtue”, 6 Kant distinguishes the

philanthropist from what he calls “the friend

of man” (allow me to refer those whom this

distinction may interest to what I say in The

Politics of Friendship in the passage devoted to

the “black swan” 7 ). I return, then, to this first

sentence and to the German word which accom-

panies Hospitalität in parentheses: “As in the

foregoing articles, we are here concerned not with

philanthropy, but with right. In this context

hospitality [ Hospitalität ( Wirtbarkeit )] means

the right of a stranger [ bedeutet das Recht eines

Fremdlings ] not to be treated with hostility

[ en ennemi ] when he arrives on someone else’s

territory [ seiner Ankunft auf der Boden eines

andern wegen von diesem nicht feindselig

behandelt zu werden ].”

Already hospitality is opposed to what is noth-

ing other than opposition itself, namely, hostility

[ Feindseligkeit ]. The welcomed guest [ hôte ] is a

stranger treated as a friend or ally, as opposed to

the stranger treated as an enemy (friend/enemy,

hospitality/hostility). The pair we will continue to

speak of, hospitality/hostility, is in place. Before

pursuing my simple reading or quotation, I

would like to underline the German word

Wirtbarkeit which Kant adds in parentheses, as

the equivalent of the Latin Hospitalität . Wirt

( Wirtin in the feminine) is at the same time the

patron 8 and the host [ hôte ], the host* 9 who

receives the Gast , the Gastgeber , the patron of a

hotel or restaurant. Wirtlich , like gastlich ,

means “hospitable,” “welcoming.” Wirtshaus is

the café, the cabaret, the inn, the place that

accommodates. And Wirt governs the whole lexi-

con of Wirtschaft , which is to say, economy and,

thus, oikonomia , law of the household <where it

is precisely the patron of the house – he who

receives, who is master in his house, in his house-

hold, in his state, in his nation, in his city, in his

town, who remains master in his house – who

defines the conditions of hospitality or welcome;

where consequently there can be no uncondi-

tional welcome, no unconditional passage

through the door>. Here the Wirt , the Gast , is

just as much the one who as host [ hôte ] (as host*

and not as guest*) receives, welcomes, offers

hospitality in his house or hôtel , as he is, in the

first instance and with reason, the master of the

household, the patron , the master in his own

home . At bottom, before even beginning, we

could end our reflections here in the formaliza-

tion of a law of hospitality which violently

imposes a contradiction on the very concept of

hospitality in fixing a limit to it, in de-termining

it: hospitality is certainly, necessarily, a right, a

duty, an obligation, the greeting of the foreign

other [ l’autre étranger ] as a friend but on the

condition that the host*, the Wirt , the one who

receives, lodges or gives asylum remains the

patron , the master of the household, on the

condition that he maintains his own authority in

his own home , that he looks after himself and

sees to and considers all that concerns him [ qu’il

se garde et garde et regarde ce qui le regarde ]

and thereby affirms the law of hospitality as the

law of the household, oikonomia , the law of his

household, the law of a place (house, hotel, hospi-

tal, hospice, family, city, nation, language, etc.),

the law of identity which de-limits the very place

of proffered hospitality and maintains authority

over it, maintains the truth of authority, remains

the place of this maintaining, which is to say, of

truth, thus limiting the gift proffered and making

of this limitation, namely, the being-oneself in

one’s own home , the condition of the gift and of

hospitality. This is the principle, <one could say,

derrida

the aporia,> of both the constitution and the

implosion of the concept of hospitality, the

effects of which – it is my hypothesis – we will

only continue to confirm. This implosion or, if

you prefer, this self-deconstruction having

already taken place, we could, I was saying, end

here <the reflection on this aporia>. Hospitality

is a self-contradictory concept and experience

which can only self-destruct <put otherwise,

produce itself as impossible, only be possible on

the condition of its impossibility> or protect

itself from itself, auto-immunize itself in some

way, which is to say, deconstruct itself – precisely

– in being put into practice.

But in order not to stop here before even

having started, I will go on as if we had not yet

said anything and we will continue for a little

longer.

Still by way of an epigraph, I will continue

reading Kant’s text to the end, this time without

stopping. It would be possible to come to a stop

before each word, but as it is an epigraph, I won’t

do that, I will press on. We will have plenty of

opportunities to come back to it later.

deserts, but even then the ship or the camel

(the ship of the desert) makes it possible for

them to approach their fellows over these

ownerless tracts, and to utilize as a means of

social intercourse that right to the earth’s

surface which the human race shares in

common. The inhospitable behavior of coastal

dwellers (as on the Barbary coast) in plunder-

ing ships on the adjoining seas or enslaving

stranded seafarers, or that of inhabitants of the

desert (as with the Arab Bedouins), who regard

their proximity to nomadic tribes as a justifi-

cation for plundering them, is contrary to

natural right. 13 But this natural right of hospi-

tality, i.e. the right of strangers, does not

extend beyond those conditions which make it

possible for them to attempt to enter into rela-

tions with the native inhabitants. In this way,

continents distant from each other can enter

into peaceful mutual relations which may even-

tually be regulated by public laws, thus bring-

ing the human race nearer and nearer to a

cosmopolitan constitution.

If we compare with this ultimate end the

inhospitable conduct of the civilized states of

our continent, especially the commercial

states, the injustice which they display in visit-

ing foreign countries and peoples (which in

their case is the same as conquering them)

seems appallingly great. America, the negro

countries, the Spice Islands, the Cape, etc.

were looked upon at the time of their discov-

ery as ownerless territories; for the native

inhabitants were counted as nothing. In East

India (Hindustan), foreign troops were

brought in under the pretext of merely setting

up trading posts. This led to the oppression of

the natives, incitement of the various Indian

states to widespread wars, famine, insurrec-

tion, treachery and the whole litany of evils

which afflict the human race.

… The peoples of the earth have thus

entered in varying degrees into a universal

community, and it has developed to the point

where a violation of rights in one part of the

world is felt everywhere . The idea of a

cosmopolitan right is therefore not fantastic

and overstrained; it is a necessary complement

to the unwritten code of political and interna-

tional right, transforming it into a universal

right of humanity. Only under this condition

can we flatter ourselves that we are continually

advancing towards a perpetual peace. (105–08)

As in the foregoing articles, we are concerned

here not with philanthropy, but with right . In

this context, hospitality [l’hospitalité (hospi-

talitas)] means the right of a stranger not to be

treated with hostility when he arrives on some-

one else’s territory. He can indeed be turned

away, if this is done without causing his

death, 10 but he must not be treated with hostil-

ity so long as he behaves in a peaceable manner

in the place he happens to be. The stranger

cannot claim the right of a guest to be enter-

tained [ un droit de résidence], for this would

require a special friendly agreement whereby

he might become a member of the native

household for a certain time. He may only

claim a right of resort [ un droit de visite], 11 for

all men are entitled to present themselves in

the society of others by virtue of their right to

communal possession of the earth’s surface.

Since the earth is a globe, they cannot disperse

over an infinite area, but must tolerate one

another’s company. And no one originally has

any greater right than anyone else to occupy

any particular portion of the earth. 12 The

community of man is divided by uninhabitable

parts of the earth’s surface such as oceans and

hostipitality

<Perpetual peace for Kant is not simply a

utopian concept projected to infinity. As soon as

one thinks the concept of peace in all strictness,

one must be thinking of perpetual peace. A peace

that would simply be an armistice would not be

a peace. Peace implies within its concept of peace

the promise of eternity. Otherwise it is not a

peace. Kant here is only laying out the very

structure of the concept of peace, which implies

a promise of indefinite, and therefore eternal,

renewal.>

Now we are beginning or pretending to open

the door <that impossible door, sublime or not>.

We are on the threshold.

We do not know what hospitality is [ Nous

ne savons pas ce que c’est que l’hospitalité ] .

Not yet.

Not yet, but will we ever know? Is it a ques-

tion of knowledge and of time?

that they belong to the current lexicon or the

common semantics of hospitality, of all pre-

comprehension of what “hospitality” is and

means, namely, to “welcome,” “accept,”

“invite,” “receive,” “bid” someone welcome “to

one’s home,” where, in one’s own home, one is

master of the household, master of the city, or

master of the nation, the language, or the state,

places from which one bids the other welcome

(but what is a “welcome”?) and grants him a kind

of right of asylum by authorizing him to cross a

threshold that would be a threshold, <a door that

would be a door,> a threshold that is deter-

minable because it is self-identical and indivisi-

ble, a threshold the line of which can be traced

(the door of a house, human household, family or

house of god, temple or general hospital [ hôtel-

dieu ], hospice [ hospice ], hospital or poor-house

[ hôpital ou hôtel hospitalier ], frontier of a city,

or a country, or a language, etc.). We think we

comprehend all these ordinary words in French –

in which I am at home – and the French language

itself in all that it translates (translation also

being, as we noted earlier, an enigmatic phenom-

enon or experience of hospitality, if not the

condition of all hospitality in general).

And yet, even though, I am assuming, we

understand each other rather well over the mean-

ing or pre-comprehension of all this vocabulary

of hospitality and the said laws of hospitality, I

dared to begin by putting to you, in the way of a

welcome: “We do not know what hospitality

is.” In appearance, a performative contradiction

which bids welcome by acknowledging that we do

not know what “welcome” means and that

perhaps no one welcomed is ever completely

welcome <in a welcome which is not justifiably

hypocritical or conditional>, a performative

contradiction which is as unusual and confusing

as an apostrophe of the sort, “O my friends, there

is no friend,” 14 <a sentence attributed to

Aristotle,> the meaning and consequences of

which are doubtless not completely foreign,

assuming we know what “foreign [ étranger ]”

means; the whole question of hospitality is

focused here, too.

Thus, I owe you as my hosts an explanation.

This short sentence, “We do not know what

hospitality is,” which implicates us, which has

Here, in any case, is the sentence which I address

to you, which I have already addressed to you,

and which I now put in quotation marks. “We do

not know what hospitality is.” It is a sentence

which I address to you in French, in my

language, in my home, in order to begin and to

bid you welcome <where I am received in your

home> when I begin to speak in my language,

which seems to suppose that I am here <at

home> master in my own home, that I am receiv-

ing, inviting, accepting or welcoming you, allow-

ing you to come across the threshold, by saying

“ bienvenu ,” “ welcome ,”* to you.

I repeat: “We do not know what hospitality

is.”

Already, as you have heard, I have used, and

even used up, the most used words in the code of

hospitality, the lexicon of which consists of the

words “invite,” “welcome,” receive “at home”

while one is “master of one’s own home” and of

the threshold.

Consequently, to address the first sentence

with which I began, “We do not know what

hospitality is,” as a host to a guest [ comme un

hôte à un hôte (a host to a guest)] seems to

contradict, in a self-contradiction, <an aporia, if

you like,> a performative contradiction, every-

thing I have just recalled, namely, that we

comprehend all these words well enough, and

derrida

already authoritatively and in advance implicated

you in a we that speaks French, <a sentence we

comprehend without comprehending,> can have

several acceptations. At least three and doubt-

less more than four.

Before beginning to unfold them, note in pass-

ing that the word “acceptation [ acception ],” from

accipere or acceptio and which in French means

“the meaning given to a word” (and which many

people make the easy mistake of confusing with

“acception [ acceptation ]”), 15 this word “accepta-

tion” also belongs quite specifically to the

discourse of hospitality; it lives at the heart of the

discourse of hospitality; acceptation in Latin is

the same as acception, the action of receiving, the

welcome given, the way one receives.

<Obviously, a reflection on hospitality is a reflec-

tion on what the word “receive” means. What

does “receive” mean?> It is like a postscript to

Plato’s Timaeus , where <Khôra, 16 > the place is

spoken of as that which receives ( endekhomai ,

endekhomenon ), the receptacle ( dekhomenon –

which can also mean “it is acceptable, permitted,

possible”); in Latin, acceptio is the action of

receiving, reception, welcome (“reception” and

“welcome [ accueil ]” are words you also often see

at the entrances to hotels and hospitals, what

were once known as hospices, places of public

hospitality). The “acceptor” is the one who

receives, makes welcome, has – as is also said – a

welcome in store, or who approves, who accepts,

the other and what the other says or does. When

I said I am at home here speaking my language,

French, that also means I am more welcoming to

Latin and Latinate languages than to others, and

you see how violently I am behaving as master in

my own home at the very moment of welcoming.

Accepto – the frequentative of accipio (that is, of

the verb that matters most here, accipio ) which

means “to take” [ prendre ] ( capere or comprehend

in order to make come to one, in order to receive,

welcome) – accepto , that is, the frequentative of

accipio , means “being in the habit of receiving.”

Accepto : I am in the habit of receiving, of making

welcome; in this sense, from this point of view, it

is almost synonymous with recipio , which means

both “take in return, again” and “receive,”

“welcome,” “accept,” the re- often having the

sense of return or repetition, the new of “anew”

[ du nouveau de “de nouveau,” à nouveau ], and,

when the re- disappears from “receive” in the

sense of “welcome,” “accept,” even if for the first

time. Already you see that, besides the idea of

necessary repetition and thus of law, iterability,

and the law of iterability at the heart of every law

of hospitality, we have – with the semantics of

acceptation or acception, reception – the double

postulation of giving and taking ( capere ), of

giving and comprehending in itself and at home

with itself [ en soi et chez soi ], <in its language,>

not just on one occasion but in its readiness from

the outset to repeat, to renew, to continue. Yes,

yes, you are welcome. Hospitality gives and takes

more than once in its own home. It gives, it

offers, it holds out, but what it gives, offers,

holds out, is the greeting which comprehends and

makes or lets come into one’s home, folding the

foreign other into the internal law of the host

[ hôte (host, Wirt , etc . )] which tends to begin by

dictating the law of its language and its own

acceptation of the sense of words, which is to say,

its own concepts as well. The acceptation of

words is also the concept, the Begriff , the

manner in which one takes hold of or compre-

hends, takes, apprehends [ comprend , prend ,

appréhende ] the meaning of a word in giving it a

meaning.

I was saying that the sentence that I addressed to

you, which is, “We do not know what hospital-

ity is,” can have several acceptations. At least

three and doubtless more than four.

1. The first acceptation is the one that would rely

on stressing the word “know”: we do not know ,

we do not know what hospitality is. This not-

knowing is not necessarily a deficiency, an

infirmity, a lack. Its apparent negativity, this

grammatical negativity (the not-knowing) would

not signify ignorance, but rather indicate or

recall only that hospitality is not a concept which

lends itself to objective knowledge. Of course,

there is a concept of hospitality, of the meaning

of this word “hospitality,” and we already have

some pre-comprehension of it. Otherwise we

could not speak of it, to suppose that in speaking

of it we know what “speaking” means. On

the one hand, what we pre-comprehend in

this way – we will verify this – rebels against any

Derrida, Jacques - «Hostipitality» - Journal For The Theoretical Humanities.pdf

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