Hi everyone,
I have been told and have deduced from my reading of Foucault that the
"self" as we know it is never purely subject. What distinguishes
Foucault's theory, I believe, from that of someone like Marx for example
is that for Foucault, we are perpetually trapped in a state of
subject-object, power-resistance. One cannot exist without the other.
Perhaps I am wrong. Maybe someone has a more enlightening view to add to
my random thoughts.
Another thing that I have been pondering is Foucault's notion of "docile
bodies". Within "society" or as we interact with each other in the midst
of social institutions, we become "docile bodies" many, many times.
Depending on how many power relationships we become involved in, we are
"docile bodies" in a number of different contexts. My question would be,
does this mean that docility can accumulate? In terms of power
relationships, Foucault supposedly views power as "productive" rather than
dominating or destructive. Does he intend for power to be productive in
the sense that it creates something substantial and also because it adds
up or accumulates as well?
Regards,
Clara Ho
The University of Calgary
On Mon, 25 Nov 1996, Sebastian Gurciullo wrote:
>
> Hello fellow list members,
>
> I recently joined the list and having watched how things work I now feel
> comfortable enough to introduce myself. I am a Ph.D student at Monash
> University (Melbourne, Australia) and am doing research on the concept of
> the subject as it appears in contemporary thinkers like Michel Foucault,
> Charles Taylor, and Gianni Vattimo.
>
> As far as Foucault goes I am particularly interested in two aspects of his
> work. Firstly, the centrality of transgression in his early work,
> especially with the way transgression can be enacted in language to point to
> some sort of experience outside the subject, to the point of eclipsing the
> subject. Secondly, the emphasis on transformation in his late work which
> takes the form of an ascetic-aesthetic intensification of the self's
> relationship to itself as a possible way out of techniques of domination and
> as experimentation with ways of living freedom.
>
> Sebastian Gurciullo
> Send mail to: sebtempo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>
>
>