ABSTRACT
The metaphysical conception of space has been developed as a function of a boundary - be this the enclosing surface of a continent vessel, the horizon of vision implied by Kant's theory of spatiality, or the dividing line of difference which allows meaning to be enshrined within the Hegelian sign. Metaphysics encircles the present as a space whose spatiality has been erased, opening the way for a critical philosophy which, by uncovering the traces of this banished spatiality, would seek to dramatize the limits of the metaphysical discourse. As we know it within the metaphysical tradition, space is the domain where subjectivity and signification enter into a dialectic of presence and absence. As a result, their own specific spatiality, the unity they present, is the product of an act of repression. According to Derrida, what is repressed is difference, and this difference is to be thought as a machinic function which would have to embrace thought itself.
