Sean,
I asked the exact same thing of a teacher of mine years ago and he
recommended thinking of Foucault's book in somewhat the same light as Kuhn's
_Scientific Revolutions_. Have you read that book? The basic idea is that
there are incommensurable periods of human cognition -- and Foucault takes
us through different ways of looking at things. The 'order of things' is not
static; that order changes as the paradigm through which we view the world
mutates.
Another way to handle a difficult book like this is to use a good secondary
source. Gutting's book on Foucault covers the earlier Foucault, and has two
chapters on The Order of Things.
-- John
----- Original Message -----
From: guillory <guillory@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: Foucault List <foucault@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, June 17, 1999 2:15 AM
Subject: The Order of Things
> I recently started reading the Order of Things and have found it a very
difficult
> book to read. Does anyone have any suggestions on how to approach it. Or
some hints
> at its main theses.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Sean
> ***
> Sean Guillory
> guillory@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Primordial Soup Kitchen Zine Mailorder
> http://pw2.netcom.com/~guillory/catalog.html
> PO Box 1312
> Claremont, CA 91711-1312
> "But if the designing of the future and the proclamation of the ready-made
solutions
> for all times is not our affair, then we realize all the more clearly what
we have to
> accomplish in the present--I am speaking of a ruthless criticism of
everything
> existing, ruthless in two senses: The criticism must not be afraid of its
own
> conclusions, nor of conflict with the powers that be." -- K. Marx
>
I asked the exact same thing of a teacher of mine years ago and he
recommended thinking of Foucault's book in somewhat the same light as Kuhn's
_Scientific Revolutions_. Have you read that book? The basic idea is that
there are incommensurable periods of human cognition -- and Foucault takes
us through different ways of looking at things. The 'order of things' is not
static; that order changes as the paradigm through which we view the world
mutates.
Another way to handle a difficult book like this is to use a good secondary
source. Gutting's book on Foucault covers the earlier Foucault, and has two
chapters on The Order of Things.
-- John
----- Original Message -----
From: guillory <guillory@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: Foucault List <foucault@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, June 17, 1999 2:15 AM
Subject: The Order of Things
> I recently started reading the Order of Things and have found it a very
difficult
> book to read. Does anyone have any suggestions on how to approach it. Or
some hints
> at its main theses.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Sean
> ***
> Sean Guillory
> guillory@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Primordial Soup Kitchen Zine Mailorder
> http://pw2.netcom.com/~guillory/catalog.html
> PO Box 1312
> Claremont, CA 91711-1312
> "But if the designing of the future and the proclamation of the ready-made
solutions
> for all times is not our affair, then we realize all the more clearly what
we have to
> accomplish in the present--I am speaking of a ruthless criticism of
everything
> existing, ruthless in two senses: The criticism must not be afraid of its
own
> conclusions, nor of conflict with the powers that be." -- K. Marx
>