Numerous modes of contemporary theory hold that thought, and the structure of subjectivity itself, are functions of the dominant conditions of expressibility. This stance implies that the structure of subjectivity is not a function of psychic topology, but rather one of linguistic/poetic tropology. Following Nietzsche, Foucault writes that the purpose of genealogy is “to reveal the heterogeneous systems which, masked by the self, inhibit the formation of any form of identity.” The self is a fiction acting as a form of identity; the heterogeneous systems are the various plays of tropes and figures that simultaneously form the fictive self and undermine its ultimate possibility as stable form. The central problem of hermeneutics thus becomes the description of the manner in which the self is formed and maintained by the figurative structures of expression. In asking “What does that mean?” one must necessarily demand “Who is speaking?”; and in asking “Who is speaking?” one must necessarily demand “How was it said?” One might go so far as to claim that the personal voice suffuses all texts: one must discover the tropes and figures that dissimulate it.