>but what do you (and the rest of
>you out there) think Foucault means by "history of the present"? Have I
>got this all wrong?
Blaine,
I agree with what what you say about the task of genealogy as a history of
the present, telling us what we are because of what came before. But I'd
also add that these concerns of F come from his suspiscion about the
dominance of the phenomenological subject, thinking itself to be the
privileged "knower" (or the privileged moment) of the world. Foucault's
history of the present in the form of genealogy is designed to tell us
something about what we are today that we couldn't immediately tell
ourselves within our historical present. If there is a consistant theme
throughout his work I think it is this attempt from a critical distance to
analyze those present practices that go on beyond the conscious awareness
of the people who practice them. So the history of the present would be
the effort to say something about what we are that we couldn't otherwise
say as constituted subjects. Through this our subjectivities are
transformed. Of course there is so much more that can be said that I can't
possibly say in these few sentences, but in general, it is this permanent
reactivation of a critical attitude towards what the present takes as
necessary that I find fascinating.
sean