A critical approach that emphasizes the instability and ambiguity of language, symbols, and texts, and the ways in which meaning is contingent on context, power relations, and social construction. Deconstructionists argue that traditional binary oppositions and hierarchies (e.g. male/female, reason/emotion, nature/culture) are artificial and oppressive, and that language is always already implicated in power struggles and ideological conflicts. Some of the key figures associated with deconstructionism are Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault, and Judith Butler.