Derrida and intention

In my English class last year we read a little bit about Derrida and his deconstructionist theories. Hall describes his work in literary theory where he argues that only the text is important and not the author's intentions. This made me think of applying this theory to written sources such as email, text messages and even blogs like this one. I have to disagree with Derrida and say that in real life (outside of academia) people are always analyzing the each other's intentions when it comes to written electronic communication. Just this weekend my friend become very stressed out by an ambiguous text message. She kept saying "What does he MEAN by that?" What are a person's intentions when he or she decides to send an email vs. text message vs. a public facebook message. These are all questions that I hear other students talking about on a day to day basis. It seems that in real life situations, intention is often more important than the actual words.

Austin also talks about the importance of intention in Speech Act Theory. Infelicities can occur in performative utterances when a person does not have the right intentions behind those words. It seems like the intention behind the words is what makes a promise a promise, a marriage a marriage or a threat a threat. Once again, words can not be disconnected from the intentions of the speakers or writers because language does not occur in a vaccuum.