Alferi was the son of the French philosopher Jacques Derrida and psychoanalyst Marguerite Aucouturier.
Alferi studied at the École Normale Supérieure, rue d'Ulm and completed his agrégation.
[1] After his dissertation on William of Ockham, supervised by Louis Marin, Alferi began to primarily write poetry.
[citation needed] Alferi was co-founder (with Suzanne Doppelt), of the literary journal Détail, and La Revue de Littérature Générale (with Olivier Cadiot).
[10] He tried to remain discreet about his ancestry, namely his famous philosopher father Derrida, by adopting his maternal grandmother's name for public life.