[fratis]

For those interested in learning about the subject, here's a good place to start (in order):

Ferdinand de Saussure, Course in General Linguistics http://books.google.com/books?id=B0eB8mvov6wC&printsec=f...

Jacques Derrida, Of Grammatology http://www.mohamedrabeea.com/books/book1_3997.pdf

and, for fun...

Jacques Derrida, Differànce http://hydra.humanities.uci.edu/derrida/diff.html

[steveklabnik]

These are all great, but I'd be wrong to not point out that Deleuze is a bit different, in that he is a materialist. The rest of 'the continentals' went Idealist and turned to Saussre etc because they rejected essences. Deleuze's place is solving that issue, creating a neo-materialism.

(At least, that is my current understanding of the history)

[manys]

Of Grammatology is probably one of the most impenetrable books ever written. I'm not sure I'd recommend any of these as starting points.