There's lots of relevant material to this question in Foucault's 1975/76
lecture course, 'Il faut defendre la societe', Gallimard/Seuil, 1997. I
haven't read Laura Ann Stoler's book Race and the Education of Desire, Duke
UP, 1995, but I think that also speaks to these concerns. As far as I'm
aware Stoler makes a lot of use of the (then) lecture manuscript, which
might be useful for non French speakers.
BTW, has anyone read the new lecture course, Les Anormaux (74-75)? I've only
had a chance to read the first couple of lectures, but it looks fascinating.
Best wishes
Stuart
-----Original Message-----
From: Mitch Wilson <lobster@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: foucault@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
<foucault@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Monday, June 21, 1999 19:45
Subject: Re: Biopower and genocide
>Hey, Matthew
>
>Long time since this topic has been discussed, huh? Well, here's a question
>that I hope will get it started again.
>
>Can the apparent contradiction between F's concepts of power in D&P and HS1
>be resolved if we consider the Nazi belief that the genocide of the Jew was
>productive to the Arian?
>
>In this perverse reasoning, that power is productive in the mechanisms of
>genocide, death becomes productive as a mechanism and so, since it is
>productive to the Arian nation in shaping its society on the level of
>biology (genetics and the social body), becomes a mechanism of power:
>
>-- death (of the Jew) becomes productive (to the subjectivity of the Arian,
>who can supposed only exist in true form when genetically pure in a
>complementarly "pure" society).
>
>I guess for the above to be valid as a resolution to the contradiction you
>pointed out, one would have to show that, in D&P, Foucault's concept of
>power didn't deal with death, in the form of genocide, as an exclusively
>negative force, which would put in in contradiction with death, in the form
>of genocide, as a productive one in HS1.
>
>m
>
>
>
lecture course, 'Il faut defendre la societe', Gallimard/Seuil, 1997. I
haven't read Laura Ann Stoler's book Race and the Education of Desire, Duke
UP, 1995, but I think that also speaks to these concerns. As far as I'm
aware Stoler makes a lot of use of the (then) lecture manuscript, which
might be useful for non French speakers.
BTW, has anyone read the new lecture course, Les Anormaux (74-75)? I've only
had a chance to read the first couple of lectures, but it looks fascinating.
Best wishes
Stuart
-----Original Message-----
From: Mitch Wilson <lobster@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: foucault@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
<foucault@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Monday, June 21, 1999 19:45
Subject: Re: Biopower and genocide
>Hey, Matthew
>
>Long time since this topic has been discussed, huh? Well, here's a question
>that I hope will get it started again.
>
>Can the apparent contradiction between F's concepts of power in D&P and HS1
>be resolved if we consider the Nazi belief that the genocide of the Jew was
>productive to the Arian?
>
>In this perverse reasoning, that power is productive in the mechanisms of
>genocide, death becomes productive as a mechanism and so, since it is
>productive to the Arian nation in shaping its society on the level of
>biology (genetics and the social body), becomes a mechanism of power:
>
>-- death (of the Jew) becomes productive (to the subjectivity of the Arian,
>who can supposed only exist in true form when genetically pure in a
>complementarly "pure" society).
>
>I guess for the above to be valid as a resolution to the contradiction you
>pointed out, one would have to show that, in D&P, Foucault's concept of
>power didn't deal with death, in the form of genocide, as an exclusively
>negative force, which would put in in contradiction with death, in the form
>of genocide, as a productive one in HS1.
>
>m
>
>
>