International Journal of Philosophical Studies, 2014

Vol. 22, No. 1, 86–105, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09672559.2013.861003

Traces of Identity In Deleuze’s

Differential Ontology
Gavin Rae
Abstract
Deleuze’s differential ontology is a sustained attempt to think and affirm
difference as opposed to the unity of identity he insists philosophical thought has
tended to privilege. However, by distinguishing between three senses of identity,
termed identity of the identical, same, and common, I show that, while Deleuze’s
differential ontology offers a powerful critique of identity in the senses of the
identical and same, at numerous points in his analysis, such as the virtual-actual
movement, the transcendental conditions defining different forms of thinking, and
the relationship between the forms of thinking, it appears Deleuze’s affirmation
of difference depends on identity in the sense of the common. Rather than using
these instances to offer a critique of Deleuze’s differential ontology, I follow his
exhortation to read a philosopher creatively and suggest that distinguishing
between three senses of identity reveals the complexity of the difference-identity
relationship and acts as a stimulus to rethinking this relationship.
Keywords: Deleuze; difference; identity; ontology; being; multiplicity

While Deleuze follows Heidegger in placing being at the ‘centre’ of his

thinking, various commentators have noted he goes beyond Heidegger by
offering a differential account of being’s onto-genesis that aims to overcome
the tradition’s privileging of identity (Lumsden, 2002: pp 143–4; Bell, 2007:
p. 139; Beistegui, 2010: p. ix). The argument developed in this paper suggests,
however, that, at numerous points in his analysis, Deleuze’s affirmation of dif-
ference depends, at the primordial ontological level, on a form of identity his
thinking aims to replace. To explain this, I distinguish between three senses of
identity: (1) identity in the sense of the identical, which is, in many ways, the
traditional notion of identity and entails a primordial, undifferentiated, closed,
normally transcendent, totality from where difference emanates; (2) identity in
the sense of the same, entailing a thinking of difference that culminates in a
fixed unity; and (3) identity in the sense of the common, entailing a thinking
of difference as difference that, however implicitly, continues to maintain com-
mon structures across all entities that are expressed differently through each
manifestation of this difference.

© 2014 Taylor & Francis

 TRACES OF IDENTITY IN DELEUZE’S DIFFERENTIAL ONTOLOGY

This third sense is important for Deleuze’s differential ontology because hav-
ing anything in common with another multiplicity at the onto-genetic level
undermines his insistence that: (a) each multiplicity is irreducibly different; and
(b) identity is secondary to difference. While my underpinning contention is
that the success of Deleuze’s affirmation of a radical differential ontology
depends on him overcoming identity in the senses of the identical and same
and severing all forms of ontological commonality between entities, the argu-
ment developed maintains, that, although Deleuze’s ontology forcibly chal-
lenges the notion of identity in the senses of the identical and same, he
recognises transcendental features, such as the virtual-actual movement that
produces multiplicities, the transcendental features common to acts of philo-
sophical thinking, and the echo that resonates throughout different forms of
thinking, that, while producing different multiplicities, share common struc-
tures. While Lutz Ellrich (1996: p. 484) maintains that these forms of identity
indicate that Deleuze’s thinking operates on two distinct levels, an ontological
level constituted by difference that breaks into identity at the experiential level,
Levi Bryant (2008: p 43) disagrees and suggests the common transcendental
features of his ontology of being mean aspects of identity are inherent to the
primordial ontological level of his analysis. I follow the general direction of
Bryant’s conclusion but differ from him because, whereas he distinguishes
between sameness and commonality and reduces identity to sameness to claim
that Deleuze’s reliance on common transcendental features successfully allows
him to undermine the notion of identity, I suggest we need a more nuanced
notion of identity that does not reduce it to sameness. Identity must also be
thought in terms of commonality with the result that, while Deleuze’s differen-
tial ontology offers a stringent critique of identity in the senses of the identical
and same, its reliance on transcendental features common to the onto-genetic
level of each multiplicity means a form of identity continues to inform the
ontological level of Deleuze’s differential ontology. Although it may be tempt-
ing to conclude that such slippages fatally undermine his attempt to affirm dif-
ference contra identity, I follow Deleuze’s strategy of reading philosophers
affirmatively rather than critically to suggest that distinguishing between iden-
tity in the senses of the identical, same, and common not only reveals the diffi-
cult pathway ontologies of difference must traverse if difference as difference
is to be affirmed, but also prepares the way for a rethinking of the identity-dif-
ference relationship.

Being as Becoming
Deleuze starts his analysis with the claim that there has only ever been one
ontological proposition: being is univocal (DR: p. 35). Univocity emanates
from, and so returns us to, medieval Scholasticism and, more specifically, the
difference between ‘being as univocal’ and ‘being as equivocal’. Equivocity

87
 INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPICAL STUDIES

means that being is affirmed in different ways ‘in’ each thing (substances,
modes, attributes, etc.) and that these have no common measure (E: pp.
162–3). In other words, God, man, and animal are imbued by different senses
of being.

By contrast, to say that being is univocal […] means that being has only
one sense, and is said in one and the same sense of everything of which
it is said, whether it be God or man, animal or plant. (Smith, 2001:
p. 169)

The univocity of being refers, therefore, to the idea that the being of each thing
maintains the same sense of being found in other entities. As Deleuze
explains,

the univocity of being signifies that being is voice that it is said, and that
it is said on one and the same ‘sense’ of everything about which it is
said. That of which it is said is not at all the same, but being is the same
for everything about which it is said. (LS: p. 179)

While being is numerically multiple, each manifestation of being shares the

same sense of being, which, for Deleuze, is difference. While being is univo-
cal, being is not unitary, nor is it undifferentiated; it is nothing but difference
and, as a consequence, is ‘fully compatible with the existence of multiple
“forms”’ (Badiou, 2000: p. 23).
For Deleuze, there is no unified, original domain that creates different multi-
plicities, nor is it the case that different multiplicities culminate in unity; each
multiplicity is radically and absolutely different from others (Bell, 2007:
pp. 150–51). Understanding how difference manifests itself throughout Dele-
uze’s account does, however, require a brief preliminary note on the distinction
between differentiation and differenciation. As Deleuze explains, ‘we call the
determination of the virtual content of an Idea differentiation; we call the actu-
alisation of that virtuality into species and distinguished parts differenciation’
(DR: p. 207). In other words, differentiation relates to the different, but undif-
ferenciated (meaning non-spatio-temporally designated), virtual Ideas which are
transformed into spatio-temporal designation and thus made actual by a process
of differenciation. As such, difference ‘resides’ at both the virtual and actual
aspects of multiplicities. As a consequence, Deleuze claims being is nothing
but a different/ciating process (B: p. 42)1 and, for this reason, is synonymous
with the process of becoming different/ciated. Furthermore, being’s different/
ciating becoming is thoroughly affirmative and ‘comes first and foremost from
the explosive internal force which life carries within itself’ (BCD: p. 40). In
other words, contrary to accounts emanating from identity in the sense of the
identical that posit a unified, transcendental ground, Deleuze claims being’s
different/citation emanates from an immanent process of becoming being does

88
 TRACES OF IDENTITY IN DELEUZE’S DIFFERENTIAL ONTOLOGY

to ‘itself’. As he explains, ‘life as movement alienates itself in the material

form that it creates; by actualizing itself, by differentiating itself, it loses “con-
tact with the rest of itself”’ (B: p. 104). Far from being a process associated
with death (Moulard-Leonard, 2008: p. 147), being’s different/ciation is associ-
ated with life, which far from being linear and predictable, is contingent,
expressive, irregular, impulsive, un-predictable and multiple (B: p. 106).

Becoming as Multiplicity
With this, Deleuze is trying to describe a process whereby being becomes in a
number of different ways simultaneously without this becoming being con-
tained or constrained within an over-arching unity. As such, ‘multiplicity does
not […] designate a combination of one and the many, but only an organiza-
tion of the heterogeneous that does not require an overarching identity in order
to operate as a system’ (Ansell-Pearson, 1999: p. 156). Contrary to thinking
identity through difference or difference from identity, Deleuze introduces the
concept ‘multiplicity’ to denote an alternative way of understanding being as
nothing but becomings that exist through and because of a process of continu-
ous, spontaneous, open-ended different/ciation.
To further describe the extensive and intensive bursting forth of multiplici-
ties, Deleuze introduces the concept ‘rhizome’, going so far as to maintain that
‘“rhizome” is the best term to designate multiplicities’ (LJM: p. 366). The rhi-
zome is a botanical structure delineating a particular means and method of
growth which bursts forth in unexpected ways, with this bursting forth lacking
a central point that generates and unifies its off-shoots. To explain rhizomes
further, Deleuze contrasts them to tree-becomings, which entail a vertical, hier-
archical, and ordered process grounded in fixed roots that generate and unify
its various branches in accordance with an inner essence (ATP: p. 5). While
tree-becomings proceed through a linear, hierarchical process, whereby the
seed realizes itself in the tree, rhizomes creep horizontally, shooting off in
unexpected, non-linear directions which are not dependent on or generated by
a fixed, unifying centre or inner essence (ATP: pp. 7–8, 13, 14).
As a consequence, and while it may appear that being different/ciates itself
into closed unities, Deleuze’s point is that multiplicities are not: (1) fixed or
closed beings, but are constantly becoming; and (2) formed by coherent, strict,
unitary boundaries that distinguish them from others. While they may appear
to be coherent and unified, multiplicities are constantly altering wholes com-
posed of various lines which branch out in unexpected, non-linear, non-uni-
form ways (L: p. 161). If we perceive a boundary, it is not because there is a
strict boundary that encloses multiple parts, but because the multiple elements
that compose the multiplicity have coalesced in such a fashion that the multi-
plicity appears to form a coherent, closed whole. Rather than identity creating
multiplicities, ‘multiplicity indicates a group of lines or dimensions that cannot

89
 INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPICAL STUDIES

be reduced to one another’ (PAD: p. 310). As ‘the real element in which things
happen’ (OP: p. 146), the unity of identity does not precede or create multi-
plicities, ‘unifications are in fact processes which are produced and appear in
multiplicities’ (PITP: p. 315). As the configuration of the multiplicity alters as
a result of being’s different/ciation, so too does the subject, totality, and iden-
tity that result from that particular multiplicity. Multiplicities are not closed
totalities, but are open, flexible amalgamations of different and distinct compo-
nent parts.
These are significant statements relating to Deleuze’s rejection of identity
and, as such, need more attention. To do so, I want to return to the notion of
identity to distinguish between different senses of identity and, more specifi-
cally, to distinguish between, what I will call, identity in the senses of the
identical and the same as a precursor to showing how Deleuze’s notion of mul-
tiplicity criticises both. This will then set up the discussion, later in the paper,
of the third sense of identity, to be termed identity of the common, to suggest
that Deleuze combats the first two senses of identity by relying on the third.
Identity in the sense of the identical describes the idea that there is a closed,
unified totality that precedes and is, therefore, the primordial ‘thing’ that gener-
ates difference. In short, this unified totality, which has often been thought to
be transcendent, is the undifferentiated focal point that is subsequently differen-
tiated into different entities. As a consequence, identity in the sense of the
identical tends to maintain a two-realm metaphysics based on a primordial
undifferentiated realm of identity and a secondary, empirical realm of
difference. As such, difference is downgraded to a second-order phenomenon.
Deleuze’s notion of multiplicity forcibly rejects this by rejecting the notion that
being is: (1) split into two realms; and (2) foundationally unified, with differ-
ence resulting from this unity. Deleuze’s notion of multiplicity is clear that: (a)
at no point does difference emanate from a closed, fixed unity; and (b) any
momentary unity that appears emanates from the different components of the
multiplicity coalescing to form a temporary unity before dissolving into
another configuration. There is no actual, closed, fixed unity, only the tempo-
rary configuration of unity as a consequence of difference.
This brings us to the second sense of identity: identity of the same. Whereas
identity in the sense of the identical posits a foundational, unified entity from
where difference emanates, identity in the sense of the same starts from differ-
ence and suggests this difference culminates in unity. In short, this sense of
identity collects a primordial difference at the end of a particular process and,
in so doing, reduces difference to the same. Deleuze’s notion of multiplicity
rejects this because, for him, while identity may appear, any identity: (1)
appears from difference, thereby confirming that difference is primary; and (2)
is not final, but continues to become, thereby once again re-establishing the
primacy of difference. For Deleuze, being’s different/citation has no teleology,
end-point or goal (B: p. 106), nor is there any ‘preformed logical order to be-
comings and multiplicities’ (ATP: p. 277). Being’s different/ciation entails a
90
 TRACES OF IDENTITY IN DELEUZE’S DIFFERENTIAL ONTOLOGY

random, independent, spontaneous, and immanent becoming. In other words,

being’s different/ciation ‘cannot be brought back to Some Thing as a uniting
superior to all things, nor to a Subject as an act that brings about a synthesis
of things’ (IAL: p. 389). Being different/ciates itself immanently through an
auto-poietic, affirmative act (E: pp. 173–4) with the result that its rhizomic-be-
comings are chaotic, disordered, random, multiple, immanent, and open-ended
(ATP: pp. 7–8, 13–14).

Difference and Negation

As a thinker who seeks to promote open-ness and affirmation, Deleuze is
highly critical of negation ensuring that any explication of his differential
ontology will benefit from a brief outline of his critique of negation. Deleuze’s
critique of negation centres on the idea that: (1) thinking that emphasises and
becomes through the process of negation is inherently life-denying (DR:
p. 52); and (2) the opposition negation works through fails to truly understand
(a) the key difference between the two terms opposed, and (b) the notion of
difference itself. According to Deleuze, the opposition inherent to negation
entails and depends on a specific form of difference he will call external differ-
ence. The key problem with this form of difference, for Deleuze, is it does not
think difference itself, but merely differentiates one multiplicity from another.
Each multiplicity is defined through its relationship to another rather than
through its own self-perpetuating act of self-differentiation. For this reason,
Deleuze implicitly maintains that external difference is a reactive form of dif-
ference opposed to being’s affirmative different/ciation (DR: p. 28). By empha-
sising and working through external difference, negation fails to understand
and appreciate that being perpetuates itself through a process of internal differ-
ent/ciation. To further illustrate his point, Deleuze explains that while ‘negation
is opposed to affirmation […] affirmation differs from negation’ (NP: p. 188).
While somewhat cryptic, the point is to indicate that the relationship between
affirmation and negation does not depend on opposition, nor does it emanate
from a dialectical relationship, because: (1) difference is purely affirmative;
and (2) negation has no role to play in the being or becoming of affirmation
(NP: p. 188). Lacking any form of affirmation that would bring it within the
orbit of difference, negation must be characterized in an alternative way to
affirmation. What Deleuze appears to be trying to say is that affirmation is pri-
mordial in the relationship, existing independently from all else. Negation is
dependent on affirmation, in so far as negation negates affirmation, with the
consequence that, while affirmation is different to negation, affirmation does
not result from the negation of negation. As Deleuze puts it, ‘only affirmation
subsists as an independent power; the negative shoots out from it like light-
ning, but also becomes absorbed into it, disappearing into it like soluble fire’
(NP: p. 176).

91
 INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPICAL STUDIES

Having identified that affirmation is different from and independent of

negation, whereas negation is dependent on and thus opposed to affirmation,
Deleuze goes on to show how affirmation affirms. For Deleuze, the answer lies
in the nature of difference itself in so far as his analysis implies a non-negative
form of difference. Indeed, in Difference and Repetition, Deleuze is clear that
‘a concept of difference without negation’ (DR: p. xx) is exactly what he is
aiming for. To create it, he turns to the question of difference itself; not differ-
ence in relation to identity or difference between two multiplicities, but ‘pure
difference, the pure concept of difference, not difference mediated within the
concept in general, in the genus [or] the species’ (DR: p. 60). Engaging with
the concept ‘difference’ leads Deleuze to recognise two fundamental types of
difference: differences in degree and differences in kind. Difference in kind
refers to the fundamental spatio-temporal difference between two multiplicities.
The second form of difference, entitled difference in intensity or degree, entails
a form of internal difference ‘which constitutes the being “of” the sensible’
(DR: p. 236). Deleuze's linking of difference in intensity to difference itself
ensures there are two senses of this form of difference: (1) a primordial, tran-
scendental sense of difference in intensity relating to difference itself, which
(2) finds expression, through the differenciation process, in empirical reality in
terms of different actual multiplicities. Importantly, given that external differ-
ence fails to think difference itself or explain the generation of multiplicities,
Deleuze privileges internal difference as the truest form of difference because
it entails an affirmative form of difference and, due to its self-different/ciation,
explains the process through which actual multiplicities are generated (DR:
p. 28). For this reason, Deleuze not only links internal difference to being or
life itself (BCD: p. 40), but also maintains that it is upon this affirmative,
spontaneous act of internal self-different/citation that negation depends. With
this, Deleuze accounts for why identity arises, undermines its privileging by
showing it emanates from difference, and affirms difference in non-
oppositional, spontaneous, and self-generating terms.

Moments of Identity in Deleuze’s Differential Ontology

Lutz Ellrich (1996: p. 484) has, however, questioned the extent to which Dele-
uze’s valorization of difference entails a break from identity. In particular, Ell-
rich maintains that Deleuze’s attempt is flawed because it fails to recognize
that difference cannot exclude identity, but is dependent on, and necessarily
point towards, identity. While we have seen Deleuze agrees that identity can
emanate from difference, he forcibly rejects the notion that identity precedes
difference or that difference depends on identity. However, according to Ell-
rich, difference can exclude identity only if it identifies differentiation as that
which it is. This, however, posits difference in opposition to identity, which,
far from eliminating identity, actually leads to the identity of differential

92
 TRACES OF IDENTITY IN DELEUZE’S DIFFERENTIAL ONTOLOGY

non-identity. Furthermore, by insisting on the self-generation of difference,

Deleuze fails to recognise that, while the multiplicities created from being’s
different/ciation may be different, the process or act through which they exist –
being’s affirmative different/ciation – remains the same. This is not to say the
content of the act is the same, but that the form through which each multiplic-
ity becomes what it is shares common structures. While Ellrich doesn’t spell
out what this act of different/citation entails, if we return to Deleuze’s analysis
of difference we can flesh it out.
For Deleuze, being becomes through a process of different/citation whereby
a differentiated, but undifferenciated, virtual Idea is differenciated into actual
multiplicities. There are two key components to this movement that appear to
point towards common features: (1) difference; and (2) the virtual-actual move-
ment. Starting with difference, Deleuze’s insistence on the relationship between
univocity and difference has left more than one commentator confused. Most
famously, it led Alain Badiou to insist that the univocity of being undermines
the difference of each multiplicity to the extent that Deleuze’s thinking reduces
difference to the One of Platonism; a position that, depending on how Badiou’s
comments are interpreted, seems to conclude that Deleuze’s ontology affirms
identity in the senses of, what I have called, the identical or the same (see
Badiou 2000: pp. 10, 16, 25). Badiou’s interpretation has, however, been forc-
ibly challenged by, amongst others, Nathan Widder (2001: p. 43) who explains
that, by being’s univocity, Deleuze is not ‘concerned with establishing a unity
among differences, but rather with linking differences through their difference’.
Rather than disclosing unity through difference, Widder insists that Deleuze’s
notion of univocity merely means the only ‘thing’ multiplicities have in com-
mon is that: (a) they are different; and (b) difference is constitutive of their
ontological structures. In other words, while being is expressed through the
same voice throughout all multiplicities, this voice is difference, meaning it is
‘said’ differently across all entities.
Given this reveals that difference, by virtue of always being different, is not
and cannot be that which is common to all multiplicities, my suggestion is that
it is the virtual-actual movement that reveals that common features continue to
exist in Deleuze’s onto-genetic account of being. With this, I am claiming that,
along with multiplicity, difference, and immanence, virtuality (and its relation-
ship to actuality) is one of the cornerstones of Deleuze’s differential ontology.
While there is not sufficient space to undertake a detailed engagement with this
concept and its relationship to actuality, let me just say that, on my understand-
ing, virtuality accompanies and operates, if only implicitly, throughout all Del-
euze’s analyses.2 The scope of these writings and the time that passes between
them indicates the central role it plays and continues to play in Deleuze’s
thinking, a centrality that emanates from the way it binds difference, multiplic-
ity, and becoming ‘together’ to allow Deleuze to propose a coherent, system-
atic, but differentiated, ontogenetic account of being.3 For example, as we have
noted, in Difference and Repetition, Deleuze maintains that difference is
93
 INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPICAL STUDIES

different/ciated between a virtual differentiated Idea and a differenciated actual-

ity, a distinction that reveals the central role the virtual-actual movement occu-
pies in the process of different/ciation through which multiplicities are created.
This is further seen from A Thousand Plateaus’ discussion of the rhizome,
which is, on my understanding, dependent on the virtual-actual movement
because, as noted in Difference and Repetition, multiplicities, which Deleuze
claims are best described by the term ‘rhizome’ (LJM: p. 366), arise from the
different/ciation process that proceeds from virtuality to actuality. As a conse-
quence, Deleuze writes that differentiat/ciation entails a ‘movement that creates
multiplicities, which are composed of actual and virtual elements’ (DII:
p. 112). Similarly, Deleuze’s insistence, in What is Philosophy?, that philo-
sophical concepts emanate from the actualization of different aspects of a vir-
tual Idea, and his claim, in ‘Immanence: A Life’, that ‘the plane of immanence
is itself virtual’ (IAL: p. 392), demonstrate that the virtual-actual movement
lies at the heart of philosophical creation. As such, we see that the virtual-
actual relationship plays a central role in Deleuze’s differential ontology, a cen-
trality that re-enforces my decision to use it to examine whether Deleuze’s
ontology is able to think and affirm difference as and from difference.
This is not to say, however, that Deleuze maintains the virtual-actual move-
ment is a linear movement or that it always entails the same movement. Dele-
uze is very clear that the virtual ‘itself’ is always differentiated, with this
differentiation moving at a speed and timeframe ‘shorter than the shortest con-
tinuous period imaginable’ (DII: p. 112), that the movement through which vir-
tualities become actual multiplicities is multiple, as evidenced by his
discussions of the different ways actualities become through, for example,
sense, crystallizations, folds and inflections (FLB: pp. 3, 6–8, 14–15), echoes,
conceptualization, functionality, and affectuality, and that actual multiplicities
continue to become through rhizomic becomings. While Deleuze is clearly try-
ing to show the ways in which the onto-genesis of actual multiplicities ema-
nates from difference and remains as difference, my argument is that,
irrespective of the different forms the virtual-actual movement takes (intensity,
sense, crystallization, echo, fold, etc.), each multiplicity only is by passing
from virtual being to actual being and that this movement entails, by virtue of
simply passing from virtual being to actual being, a commonality inherent to
all multiplicities. In other words, the origin, way, and ‘end’ of each virtual-
actual movement may be different, but, at its simplest, the path is common: to
be actual, multiplicities must pass from virtual being to actual being. As a con-
sequence, while each virtuality is differentiated with each actual multiplicity
created emanating from a specific differenciation of its differentiated virtuality
that ‘itself’ keeps different/ciating, there is a transcendental virtual-actual
movement common to all actual multiplicities that brings us to the third sense
of identity intimated to throughout this paper: identity in the sense of the
common.

94
 TRACES OF IDENTITY IN DELEUZE’S DIFFERENTIAL ONTOLOGY

Whereas identity in the senses of the identical and same posit a closed,
undifferentiated unity as the source or culmination of difference respectively,
identity in the sense of the common entails a thinking of difference as differ-
ence that, however implicitly, continues to maintain common structures across
all entities that are expressed differently through each manifestation of this dif-
ference. My suggestion is that, while Deleuze claims the virtual-actual relation-
ship is inherently differential, in so far as each virtual Idea is differentiated,
each virtual-actual movement is differenciated, and the actual multiplicity pro-
duced is differenciated and continues to different/ciate, the mere existence of
this common virtual-actual movement points to the conclusion that, no matter
how particular the movement, all multiplicities are structured around this com-
mon virtual-actual transcendental structure. While the content and differenciat-
ing process of each virtual Idea may be unique to each actuality, the
transcendental nature of Deleuze’s ontology ensures there are transcendental
features, such as the virtual-actual movement, that are common to each
actuality.
Ellrich’s conclusion has, however, been contested by, amongst others, Jeffrey
Bell, who associates Deleuze with a dynamic metaphysical system and so con-
cludes that a dynamic system is never based on nor does it entail identity; it is
‘in-between’ identity and non-identity. As such, Ellrich’s (1996) insistence that
Deleuze’s differential ontology culminates in an identity is simply wrong. Iden-
tity, for Bell (2007: p. 173), entails a fixed, static identity which Deleuze’s
dynamic metaphysical system is opposed to and so avoids. While Bell is cor-
rect to maintain that Deleuze’s ontology recognizes that, while identity exists,
it emanates from difference, he fails to notice that Deleuze also maintains that
any identity is momentary for the simple reason that no sooner has being ‘uni-
fied’ than it different/ciates into a new form. As a consequence, Bell rightly
understands that Deleuze holds that difference precedes identity, but fails to
engage with Ellrich’s claim that neither difference nor identity precede one
another, but that identity is always differential and difference takes on an iden-
tity in the form of the identity of differential non-identity. As such, Bell fails
to recognize that escaping identity cannot simply be achieved by positing dif-
ference in distinction to identity because difference then becomes the identity
of the entity. This charge doesn’t relate to whether difference or identity is pri-
mordial, but to whether it is, in fact, possible to order them in a hierarchical
fashion delineating one as foundational. Bell would, no doubt, respond that dif-
ference is not opposed to identity, but is different to it and so cannot be col-
lected back up into identity, but it is not entirely clear this solves the problem.
After all, by claiming difference is different to identity, Ellrich would presum-
ably retort that difference continues to be defined through its relationship to
identity.
While it may, in fact, be questioned whether commonality can be placed
under the rubric of identity, I want to suggest that, for ontologies of radical dif-
ference, it must be for the simple reason that, by claiming identity emanates
95
 INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPICAL STUDIES

from difference, Deleuze must sever any internal onto-genetic unifying linkage
between multiplicities to think difference as difference. As such, to succeed,
Deleuze’s affirmation of difference must not only overcome the notion of iden-
tity in the senses of the identical and same, but must also overcome identity in
the sense of commonality so as to truly remove all forms of unity from the
onto-genesis of being. To reiterate, my suggestion is that, while Deleuze’s dif-
ferential ontology overcomes identity in the senses of the identical and same, it
often implicitly relies on transcendental features common to entities to show
how multiplicities become. As such, it is questionable whether each multiplic-
ity, at the primary, ontological level, is as radically distinct and different as
Deleuze’s affirmation of difference maintains. To show this, I will focus on
three moments in which identity as commonality appears to break through in
Deleuze’s differential ontology: the virtual-actual movement, the conditions of
philosophical thinking, and the relationship between philosophical, scientific,
and artistic thinking.
While Deleuze claims each multiplicity emanates from a specific and unique
virtual-actual movement that produces a unique, open-ended, concrete multi-
plicity (KCP: p. 68), I have argued that this common principle of production
reveals that each multiplicity is underpinned by a common different/ciating
structure that actualizes a virtual Idea. While Deleuze appears to be committed
to the claim that: (1) these transcendental features are nothing and so do not
entail a priori commitments regarding the content of the production process
that actualises the virtual of each multiplicity; and (2) the transcendental fea-
tures of each multiplicity are unique to that particular multiplicity, thereby safe-
guarding the difference of each multiplicity, it is difficult to see how he can
square this with his claim that the actualization of each multiplicity emanates
from a virtual-actual structure that produces each individuated multiplicity.
This is not to say that each multiplicity is the same or differenciates itself in
the same way or creates the same thing; it is to say that each multiplicity, by
virtue of the virtual-actual structure differenciates itself and, irrespective of the
actual multiplicity produced, shares this common virtual-actual production
movement with other multiplicities.
Again, while it may be questioned whether this is sufficient to call into
question Deleuze’s affirmation of difference, after all he does show that the vir-
tual Ideas are differentiated, that the virtual-actual movement is differentiated,
and that the multiplicities produced are differentiated internally and externally,
leading to the conclusion that ‘while actual forms or products can resemble
each other, the movements of production do not resemble each other, nor do
the products resemble the virtuality that they embody’ (B: p. 104), I want to
suggest it does for the simple reason that if my suggestion that commonality is
a form of identity is correct and if it is accepted that Deleuze posits a transcen-
dental structure common to all acts of production so each is by passing from
virtual being to actual being, it follows that a form of identity continues to
constitute the onto-genetic level of being’s becoming. While not suggesting
96
 TRACES OF IDENTITY IN DELEUZE’S DIFFERENTIAL ONTOLOGY

this means each multiplicity is identical or the same, I am suggesting that, by

claiming being becomes through a common transcendental productive move-
ment from virtual being to actual being, Deleuze relies on an ontological com-
monality inherent to each multiplicity to show the way multiplicities are
actualized. Although it may not seem much, if each multiplicity emanates from
a virtual-actual movement, each shares an ontological commonality with oth-
ers, which means that a form of identity, in the sense of the identity of the
common, runs through and so unites each multiplicity at the ontological level.
We also see this sense of identity in other contexts as well, most explicitly in
Deleuze’s analysis of the transcendental conditions of the various modes of
thinking and the inter-relationship between them.
In What is Philosophy?, Deleuze famously maintains that philosophy is ‘the
discipline that involves creating concepts’ (WP: p. 5). This leads to a detailed
analysis of concepts that reveals they are not singular in either meaning or
composition, but are unique constellations of component parts. That concepts
are composed of multiple components does not, however, mean that the com-
ponents of a concept: (1) fit together seamlessly or in a singular manner; or (2)
disclose a singular predetermined picture of being. While fitting together, the
connections between the component parts of a concept are jaggy, over-lapping,
heterogeneous, and fragmented, ensuring each is open, fragmentary, and multi-
ple, and in no way forms a closed, totalizing whole. Each concept changes as
its component parts change, as seen from the way Kant took Descartes’ con-
ception of the ‘I’ (composed of thinking, being, and doubting) and added time
to it to produce a fundamentally different conception of the ego (WP: pp.
24–7, 31–2). Contrary to the Platonic insistence that each representation of an
Idea is unified under the singularity of a universal Idea, Deleuze insists that,
due to the different configurations of their component parts, two conceptions
of the ‘same’ concept entail two fundamentally different concepts.
To further highlight the difference inherent to each philosophical system,
Deleuze insists each concept is created in response to the geo-historical situa-
tion prevalent at the time. This aspect of his analysis feeds into and is depen-
dent on his differential ontology. As noted, Deleuze’s ontology insists being
different/ciates itself through a rhizomic-becoming. The intersection of the vari-
ous multiplicities created from this different/ciation creates obstacles to the
free-flowing different/ciation of being. These obstacles can be conceptualized
by thought into problems which are given conceptual solutions which are
shaped by the way the problem is posed (B: p. 16). Because being’s different/
ciation is rhizomic and continuous, the geo-historical situation that shapes
philosophical thought also constantly changes, which ensures each philosophi-
cal system is shaped by responses to irreducibly different configurations of
being. Two consequences arise from this: (1) each system of thought is irre-
ducibly different; and (2) the concepts created in relation to one configuration
of being cannot be transplanted wholesale to another configuration. Rather than
mimic another thinker’s thought, we must create original conceptual solutions
97
 INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPICAL STUDIES

to deal with or solve the problems thrown up by each specific configuration of

being (F: p. 94; OP: p. 148).
Rather than simply being a collection of random concepts, however, each
thinker’s thought forms a unified and coherent system of thought. More specif-
ically, each concept is embedded within and gains meaning from a pre-concep-
tual background called the ‘plane of immanence’ (WP: p. 35). In line with the
immanence of his thinking, Deleuze insists the plane of immanence inherent to
each system of thought does not precede its concepts, nor does it lie there fully
formed waiting for concepts to populate it. The plane is nothing but its con-
cepts in that it has no content other than the composition and constellation of
its concepts (WP: p. 36). As such, the plane forms the horizon that holds the
various concepts of a philosopher’s thinking together with this horizon shaped
by the concepts that populate it (WP: p. 36). Philosophical creation is, there-
fore, a constructivism that occurs on two levels: the creation of concepts and
the simultaneous setting up of a plane of immanence (WP: pp. 34–5). In turn,
these are complemented by conceptual personae, which are characters invented
to present and bring to life the concepts and worldviews created. There are
two types of conceptual personae. The first relates to the concrete, individual
philosopher that created the concept and plane of immanence upon which the
concept exists. While the philosopher’s name may not be mentioned in the
text, he exists implicitly in the background so that his presence accompanies
the text and its concepts. Thus, we get ‘Aristotle’s substance, Descartes’
cogito, Leibniz’s monad, Kant’s condition, Schelling’s power, Bergson’s dura-
tion’ (WP: p. 7). The second entails the creation of characters to speak or dis-
cuss the concept. This entails a literary technique whereby the concept is
presented by an abstract character who is taken to be distinct from the author,
with the consequence that the composition of the text is complicated. Classic
examples of this type of conceptual personae include: Plato’s Socrates, Des-
cartes’ madman, Kierkegaard’s ‘Knight of Faith’, and Nietzsche’s ‘Zarathustra’
(WP: p. 64).
While in no way meant to be a systematic or holistic account of Deleuze’s
impressive and original analysis of philosophy, this brief outline suffices to
show that, for Deleuze, philosophical thinking is composed of three aspects:
concept-creation, the setting-up of a plane of immanence, and the invention of
conceptual personae (WP: pp. 76–7). Although Deleuze is adamant that the
history of philosophy is a ‘theatre’ (GDTP: p. 144) composed of different con-
ceptual personae, horizons, solutions, and concepts, there are commonalities
inherent to the various systems of thought, in so far as each, by virtue of being
a philosophical system, involves the creation of concepts, the setting-up of a
plane of immanence, and the invention of conceptual personae. While the spe-
cifics of each system may be different, the various systems share the formal
conditions necessary to be considered as philosophical, thereby ensuring that,
despite Deleuze’s best efforts, each system shares common transcendental fea-
tures. These similarities may only be formal conditions of philosophy, in so far
98
 TRACES OF IDENTITY IN DELEUZE’S DIFFERENTIAL ONTOLOGY

as they delineate the parameters that define thinking as philosophical and so do

not determine its content, but Deleuze’s (1) analysis of philosophy explicitly
rejects the notion that there is continuity to the history of philosophy; and (2)
differential ontology insists on the radical difference in kind of each thing. By
defining the formal conditions that delineate philosophical thought, Deleuze
points towards common themes that unite the various philosophical systems
and so appears to undermine his claim that each philosophical system is differ-
ent in kind. This is exacerbated further by a number of statements Deleuze
makes regarding the relationship between the various modes of thought.
While Deleuze maintains philosophy is defined by the creation of concepts,
he recognizes that there are other forms of thought. Starting with science,
Deleuze claims it is defined by the creation of functions, which are complex
multiplicities composed of elements called functives that explain the nature of
being in quantifiable terms. Importantly, however, functions do not simply
exist on their own, but ‘derive all their power from reference, whether this
reference be reference to states of affairs, things, or other propositions’ (WP:
p. 138). Whereas the chaos of being is infinite in that it entails an open-
ended rhizomic-becoming, science slows this chaos down by placing it within
absolute points of reference, such as the Big Bang, Absolute Zero, and the
speed of light, that delineate its movement (WP: p. 119). It is only by placing
the chaos of being within this ‘freeze-frame’ (WP: p. 119) that it can be
observed, measured, and quantified. But given that science results from and
entails a process of observation, it requires observers who set up and observe
the results in relation to the constants of the plane of reference. They are the
ones who set up the experiments, ensure they conform to strict methodologi-
cal procedures, collate results, and delineate the conclusions from those
results.
Existing alongside philosophy and science is artistic thinking, which is
linked to percepts and affects. In other words, art creates sensations through
which we view and think the world. Sensations do not, however, simply arise
out of the blue; much like philosophy and science, art is also dependent on a
background horizon called the plane of composition, which forms the back-
ground assumptions, style, and content that leads to the creation of specific
percepts and affects. While philosophy invents conceptual personae and sci-
ence depends upon observers, Deleuze maintains that art relates to figures,
which are either sculptures of figures, landscapes, faces, or visions (WP:
p. 177). Whereas philosophical creation creates concepts unhindered by con-
straints and limits, and science entails the creation of functions which map
variations in being within the constraints of its plane of reference, art entails a
creative resemblance. In other words, art aims to reproduce something already
there, whether it is an impression of a landscape or the expression of an idea
or image, but does so in a way that is always creative. Rather than reproduce
the image or thing as it truly is, art creates a new multiplicity that resembles,
but is never the same as, that which was intended (WP: p. 173). Whereas phi-
99
 INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPICAL STUDIES

losophy aims to continuously and freely create concepts that explore the chaos
of being, and science creates functions to chart the variations of being within
fixed points of reference, artistic creation aims to capture and express being’s
infinity in finite form (WP: p. 197).
This all too brief summary reveals that philosophy creates concepts, with
this creation emanating from a plane of immanence which is limitless, invents
conceptual personae, and entails a process of pure differential self-generation;
science occurs through functions which refer to specific planes of reference
that delineate the parameters of experiments observed by an observer who
charts the observed variations as these refer to the constants of its plane of ref-
erence; and art occurs through sensations that emanate from a plane of compo-
sition that creates figures that resemble a preconceived image or idea. The
important point to highlight is that, for Deleuze, ‘thinking is thought through
concepts, or functions, or sensations and no one of these thoughts is better than
another, or more fully, completely, or synthetically “thought”’ (WP: p. 198).
Philosophy, science, and art are equal forms of thought that are, nonetheless,
different in kind to each other. However, in a number of texts, Deleuze points
towards an alternative conclusion. In particular, he maintains that, while philos-
ophy and art are distinct forms of thought, concepts are not opposed to per-
cepts and affects; concepts have perceptual and affectual significance (OP:
p. 137, RBS: p. 164). As such, philosophy and art ‘often pass into each other
in a becoming that sweeps them both up in an intensity which co-ordinates
them’ (WP: p. 66). Similarly:

philosophy has a fundamental need for the science that is contemporary

with it […] because science constantly intersects with the possibility of
concepts and because concepts necessarily involve allusions to science
that are neither examples nor applications, nor even reflections.
(WP: p. 162)

While Deleuze leaves it to scientists to determine the exact ways in which sci-
ence has need of philosophy, he clearly thinks it is a symbiotic relationship
and so suggests a reciprocal relationship between philosophy and science (WP:
p. 162). With this, Deleuze is pointing towards some form of inter-relationship
between the disciplines.
While Deleuze points towards an external alliance in the English Preface to
Difference and Repetition, insisting that, despite their irreducible methods, con-
tents, and purposes, the various disciplines can combine their independent anal-
yses, his most developed thinking on the inter-relationship between the
disciplines occurs in the 1985 essays, Mediators, where he claims that,
although philosophy, science, and art entail different forms of thinking, there
are ‘echoes and resonances between them’ (M: p. 123). The notion of echo
points towards an intimate, internal relationship between the three disciplines
that overcomes their difference in kind. The echo is not an external
100
 TRACES OF IDENTITY IN DELEUZE’S DIFFERENTIAL ONTOLOGY

relationship wherein each discipline hears the call of another and applies its
perspectives to its mode of thinking, but entails an internal relationship where
the content of the various disciplines infiltrates and shapes the content of oth-
ers. The way each shapes the others is never singular, or linear, but develops
and occurs along ‘separate melodic lines in constant interplay with one
another’ (M: p. 125). The echo reverberates through the disciplines at the pre-
reflective level, thereby allowing each to spontaneously shape and impact on
the conclusions and mode of thinking of the others (M: p. 125). As a conse-
quence, and despite having claimed that the various disciplines are distinct
from one another, Deleuze appears to subsequently claim that each interacts
with, shapes, defines, and determines the content and structure of the others.
Far from being irreducibly different to one another, Deleuze’s notion of echo
indicates a common thread that connects and runs through the various modes
of thinking.

Concluding Remarks
It appears, therefore, that there are, at least, three separate moments where the
identity of the common slips into Deleuze’s affirmation of difference: the vir-
tual-actual movement, the structure of the various modes of thinking, and the
inter-relationship between the various modes of thinking. The question now
becomes: where do these moments of unity reside within Deleuze’s thinking?
For Lutz Ellrich (1996), for example, they disclose that Deleuze’s thinking
operates on two distinct and contradictory levels. Whereas the first is purely
logical and allows Deleuze to successfully affirm an ontology of radical differ-
ence, the second is observational and takes its cue from empirical reality.
According to Ellrich (1996: p. 484), it is on the second level that Deleuze’s
radical ontology of difference breaks down with the result that his analysis
‘must admit identity’. Once Deleuze starts to enter the world of observation
and practice, Ellrich maintains he must start to introduce moments of identity
into his analysis so as to account for the moments of common identity, such as
language, ethics, and norms, observed. The movement from a logic of pure dif-
ference to empirical observation accounts for the moments of identity found in
Deleuze’s differential ontology. While it is true Ellrich uses this explanation to
account for why moments of identity can be found in Deleuze’s thinking as a
precursor to arguing that Deleuze fails to affirm difference as difference,
Ellrich’s (1996) conclusion, one I support, is reached through arguments that I
think are suspect. In particular, Ellrich claims Deleuze fails in his attempt to
affirm difference as difference because, while he successfully offers a logic of
difference as difference, once this logic enters the empirical, moments of iden-
tity enter his analysis. But this conclusion is based on a misunderstanding of
what Deleuze is aiming for. Deleuze never claims there is no such thing as
identity; he claims any identity that arises is only temporary, and is based in a

101
 INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPICAL STUDIES

prior transcendental difference. As such, even if Ellrich successfully identifies

moments of empirical identity, Deleuze would presumably retort that this
doesn’t undermine the primacy of difference.
For this very reason, Levi Bryant (2008) rejects Ellrich’s dual-level analy-
sis, instead explaining that, properly understood, the commonality inherent to
Deleuze’s analysis is rooted in the transcendental nature of his ontology. For
Bryant, the transcendental conditions of Deleuze’s ontology explain the pro-
cess of self-generation, even if the means and ends of each self-generation
are different. In other words, because Deleuze’s ontology defines the means
through which each multiplicity produces itself, ‘the variations of difference
must be conceived as a unity of difference by virtue of having a common
principle of production underlying the variations’ (Bryant, 2008: p. 43). This
not only contradicts Ellrich’s (1996) analysis, but also appears to support my
argument that Deleuze’s ontology depends upon, and at times affirms, tran-
scendental features common to all multiplicities. The difference between Bry-
ant’s and my own position appears to be that, whereas Bryant distinguishes
sameness from commonality, maintains that identity only refers to sameness,
and so concludes that Deleuze’s ontology ‘undermines the notion of identity’
(2008: p. 119), I suggest we need a more nuanced notion of identity that
does not reduce it to the identical or same. Identity must also be thought in
terms of commonality with the result that, while Deleuze’s differential ontol-
ogy offers a stringent critique of identity in the senses of the identical and
same, its reliance on transcendental features common to each multiplicity
means a form of identity remains at the ontological level of Deleuze’s analy-
sis. Although Deleuze’s appeal to common features expressed differently
through each multiplicity may ensure each escapes identity in the senses of
the identical or the same, by failing to sever all commonalities, it fails to
fully realize the difference of each multiplicity. A more nuanced analysis of
identity and its relationship to difference is needed if difference as difference
is to be affirmed and all forms of identity are to be overcome. While my dis-
tinction between three senses of identity indicates that Deleuze’s onto-genetic
account does not escape all forms of identity, he does bring to our attention
the need to think about the relationship between difference and identity fur-
ther. By treating Deleuze’s analysis as a stimulus to thinking rather than the
final word, we will not only remain true to the content and spirit of his think-
ing, but will also be able to create a more nuanced, complex, and, somewhat
paradoxically, differentiated account of identity. In many respects, this conclu-
sion is one Deleuze would appreciate; after all, it returns us, in differentiated
form, to the question of the relationship between identity and difference and,
in so doing, appears to affirm his conclusion that difference repeats and
repetition is always different.

American University in Cairo, Egypt

102
 TRACES OF IDENTITY IN DELEUZE’S DIFFERENTIAL ONTOLOGY

Acknowledgements
The author would like to thank Emma Ingala and two anonymous reviewers for their
helpful, challenging, and insightful comments on earlier versions of this paper.

Notes
1 Referencing Deleuze’s Bergson book requires that I explain my passing off of this
commentary as Deleuze’s own thoughts. While it may be tempting to separate Dele-
uze’s commentaries on others from his ‘independent’ philosophical works, I appeal
to Deleuze’s insistence that ‘the history of philosophy is the reproduction of philoso-
phy itself’ (DR: p. xxi), to suggest that his commentaries give insights into his own
philosophy. Far from excluding Deleuze’s commentaries, I maintain they are crucial
to understanding his ‘own’ philosophy.
2 For example, besides Difference and Repetition and his writings on Bergson, Deleuze
employs it in ‘The Method of Dramatization’ (MD: pp. 101, 110); ‘How Do We Rec-
ognize Structuralism’ (HRS: pp. 178–9); ‘Doubts about the Imaginary’ (DI: p. 66);
Dialogues (DII: pp. 112–15); Cinema 2 (C2: pp. 68–70, 79–81, 273); The Logic of
Sense (LS: pp. 48, 67, 304); Anti-Oedipus (AO: pp. 140–41, 145, 270, 277, 392); A
Thousand Plateaus (ATP: pp. 104–10, 153, 396, 445, 549, 561); What is Philoso-
phy? (WP: pp. 40, 118, 121–3, 140, 153–61, 177, 181, 210, 217, 228–9), and his last
published piece, ‘Immanence: A Life’ (IAL: p. 392).
3 Admittedly, the virtual takes on a specific role and function in Anti-Oedipus where
Deleuze and Guattari temporarily critique and abandon the notion of virtuality
because of the tendency to see it as being wholly related to ideality (= symbolic or
imaginary). This abandonment is, however, temporary and ultimately clarificatory, in
so far as it allows their later thinking to recognise and affirm that virtuality (a) is nec-
essary for their system; and (b) cannot be thought in purely ideal or real terms, but
must be thought in terms of ideality and reality. As a consequence, and while it may
be thought this temporary abandonment contradicts my insistence that the virtual is a
fundamental component of Deleuze´s differential ontology, I would suggest that
Deleuze and Guattari’s flirtatious abandonment of virtuality in Anti-Oedipus and sub-
sequent reintroduction of it in A Thousand Plateaus, the second volume of Capital-
ism and Schizophrenia, reaffirms my point regarding the central role it plays in
Deleuze’s differential ontology.

Abbreviations for the Deleuze Texts Cited

AO G. Deleuze and F. Guattari (2004) Anti-Oedipus, trans. Robert
Hurley, Mark Seem, and Helen. R. Lane, London: Continuum
ATP G. Deleuze and F. Guattari (2004) A Thousand Plateaus, trans. Brian
Massumi, New York: Continuum
B G. Deleuze (1991) Bergsonism, trans. Hugh Tomlinson and Barbara
Habberjam, New York: Zone
BCD G. Deleuze (2004) ‘Bergson’s Conception of Difference’, in Desert
Islands and Other Texts, trans. Michael Taormina, New York:
Semiotext, pp. 32–51

103
 INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPICAL STUDIES

C2 G. Deleuze (1989) Cinema 2: The Time-Image, trans. Hugh

Tomlinson and Robert Galeta, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota
Press
DI G. Deleuze (1995) ‘Doubts about the Imaginary’, in Negotiations:
1972–1990, trans. Martin Joughn, New York: Columbia University
Press, pp. 62–7
DII G. Deleuze and C. Parnet (1987) Dialogues II, trans. Hugh
Tomlinson, Barbara Habberjam, and Eliot Ross Albert, New York:
Continuum
DR G. Deleuze (1994) Difference and Repetition, trans. Paul Patton,
New York: Columbia University Press
E G. Deleuze (2005) Expressionism in Philosophy: Spinoza, trans.
Martin Joughin, New York: Zone Books
F G. Deleuze (1999) Foucault, trans. Seán Hand, New York:
Continuum
FLB G. Deleuze (1993) The Fold: Leibniz and the Baroque, trans. Tom
Conley, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press
GDTP G. Deleuze (2004) ‘Gilles Deleuze Talks Philosophy’, in Desert
Islands and Other Texts, trans. Taormina, pp. 143–5
HRS G. Deleuze (2004) ‘How do We Recognise Structuralism?’, trans.
Melissa McMahon and Charles J. Stivale, in Desert Islands and
Other Texts, trans. Taormina, pp. 170–92
IAL G. Deleuze (2007) ‘Immanence: A Life’, in Two Regimes of
Madness: Texts & Interviews, 1975–1995, trans. Amy Hodges and
Mike Taormina, New York: Semiotext, pp. 388–93
L G. Deleuze (1995) ‘On Leibniz’, in Negotiations: 1972–1990, trans.
Martin Joughn, New York: Columbia University Press, pp. 156–63
LJM G. Deleuze (2007) ‘Letter to Jean-Clet Martin’ in Two Regimes of
Madness, trans. Hodges and Taormina, pp. 365–67
LS G. Deleuze (1990) The Logic of Sense, trans. Mark Lester and
Charles Stivale, New York: Columbia University Press
M G. Deleuze (1995) ‘Mediators’, in Negotiations, trans. Joughn,
pp. 121–34
MD G. Deleuze (2004) ‘The Method of Dramatization’, in Desert Islands
and Other Texts, trans. Taormina, pp. 94–116
NP G. Deleuze (2006), Nietzsche & Philosophy, trans. Hugh Tomlinson,
New York: Columbia University Press
OP G. Deleuze (1995) ‘On Philosophy’, in Negotiations, trans. Joughn,
pp. 135–55
PAD G. Deleuze (2007) ‘Preface to the American Edition of Dialogues’, in
Two Regimes of Madness, trans. Hodges and Taormina, pp. 309–12
PITP G. Deleuze (2007) ‘Preface to the Italian Edition of A Thousand
Plateaus’, in Two Regimes of Madness, trans. Hodges and Taormina,
pp. 313–16
104
 TRACES OF IDENTITY IN DELEUZE’S DIFFERENTIAL ONTOLOGY

RBS G. Deleuze (1995) ‘Letter to Reda Bensmaïa, on Spinoza’, in

Negotiations, trans. Joughn, pp. 164–6
WP G. Deleuze and F. Guattari (1994) What is Philosophy?, trans. Hugh
Tomlinson and Graham Burchell, New York: Columbia University
Press

References
Ansell-Pearson, K. (1999) Germinal Life: The Difference and Repetition of Deleuze,
New York: Routledge.
Badiou, A. (2000) Deleuze: The Clamour of Being, trans. Louise Burchill, Minneapolis,
MN: University of Minnesota Press.
Beistegui, M. (2010) Immanence: Deleuze and Philosophy, Edinburgh: Edinburgh Uni-
versity Press.
Bell, J.A. (2007) Philosophy at the Edge of Chaos: Gilles Deleuze and the Philosophy
of Difference, Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
Bryant, L.R. (2008) Difference and Givenness: Deleuze’s Transcendental Empiricism
and the Ontology of Immanence, Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press.
Ellrich, L. (1996) ‘Negativity and Difference: On Gilles Deleuze’s Criticism of Dialec-
tics’, trans. Marion Picker, MLN: Modern Language Notes 111(3): 463–87.
Lumsden, S. (2002) ‘Deleuze, Hegel, and the Transformation of Subjectivity’, The
Philosophical Forum 33(2): 143–58.
Moulard-Leonard, V. (2008) Bergson-Deleuze Encounters: Transcendental Experience
and the Thought of the Virtual, New York: State University of New York.
Smith, D. W. (2001) ‘The Doctrine of Univocity: Deleuze’s Ontology of Immanence’,
in M. Bryden (ed.) Deleuze & Religion, New York: Routledge, 167–83.
Widder, N. (2001) ‘The Rights of Simulacra: Deleuze and the Univocity of Being’,
Continental Philosophy Review 34: 437–53.

105
Copyright of International Journal of Philosophical Studies is the property of Routledge and
its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the
copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email
articles for individual use.