Différance means to both defer and differ. Originally suggested by Jacques Derrida as a Postmodernist critical consideration of conventions and aesthetics, to the writer, it alludes to the French différer (defer and differ). Différance can apply to many aspects of writing technique—i.e., a creative writer will both defer and differ from linguistic convention in order to form individual voice and additional meaning within the narrative as well as deferring and differing from axioms in order to create intimacy and irony. (“Cogito et Histoire de la Folie”)
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Sources
The Age of Insight: The Quest to Understand the Unconscious in Art, Mind, and Brain, from Vienna 1900 to the Present
A Handbook to Literature
“Cogito et Histoire de la Folie.” Jacques Derrida.
Eats Shoots and Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation
The Elements of Style.
New Oxford American Dictionary
The Norton Anthology of World Literature
The Norton Introduction to Philosophy
Woe is I: The Grammarphobe’s Guide to Better English in Plain English
Writing Fiction: A Guide to Narrative Craft
Writing the Other