Philip
Thanks for the reply. I am busy too, so i appreciate your position. In fact,
this and the response to Joe will be brief, as I am just tidying up a few
things before going away for the w/end.
>This comment, along with the issue about calling Foucault Althusser's
>student, raises a methodological issue concerning the legitimacy of
>appropriating Foucault's work for a perspective or a standpoint, rather
>than a totalizing account.
>If we read Foucault's work from a Marxist
>standpoint, we may not want to say that Heidegger's letter was so
>important.
Yes, that's possible, but I sincerely think it would be misguided. This is
not an either/or here. Foucault and Lefebvre I think both do some very
interesting things by working Nietzsche and Heidegger with and against Hegel
and Marx - amongst others.
>We may want to situate Foucault's work within the development
>of Marxist accounts of civil society, ideology, or hegemony. A
>totalizing approach, even a totalizing Marxist approach, would exclude
>such claims on the grounds that they are reductive or neglect matters
>which are more important for the whole picture.
We should certainly be attentive to the links between Althusser, Gramsci,
etc. etc. and Foucault. It would be a productive dialogue. But I really
don't think we should underestimate the role Heidegger plays in Foucault's
work. To my mind it is far more subtle than is usually acknowledged. The
Letter is but one example. But Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics is
central to the secondary thesis on the Anthropology, and to Order of Things,
Heidegger's Nietzsche book is key, as is the Technology work for the notion
of dispositif. Etc. etc. When I went back and worked on Heidegger I found
that a number of Foucault's issues were strongly anticipated in H's work.
>
>What do you think about that distinction?
>
I'm not sure of the use of the distinction. I think there is a lot of
Foucault and X type studies, that tend to neglect the wider picture. The key
test to my mind, is not to say F got that idea from there, or that interest
from here, but to see how examining thinkers he found important illuminates
his work in a useful, practical way. In my work, I think that reading
Heidegger (and Nietzsche) makes Foucault's genealogy (thought of as
historical ontology) much more useful than the historical sociology type
appropriations (what i would call ontic history); equally what i call
Foucault's writing of spatial histories.
I am sure that Joe's reading of Foucault through an Althusserian lens has
helped him, and I expect i will learn from his work. As I said before, it's
not an either/or. But I am unsure that calling Foucault a structural
Marxist, or a Nietzschean, or - indeed - a Heideggerian ontologist is very
useful.
Best wishes
Stuart
Thanks for the reply. I am busy too, so i appreciate your position. In fact,
this and the response to Joe will be brief, as I am just tidying up a few
things before going away for the w/end.
>This comment, along with the issue about calling Foucault Althusser's
>student, raises a methodological issue concerning the legitimacy of
>appropriating Foucault's work for a perspective or a standpoint, rather
>than a totalizing account.
>If we read Foucault's work from a Marxist
>standpoint, we may not want to say that Heidegger's letter was so
>important.
Yes, that's possible, but I sincerely think it would be misguided. This is
not an either/or here. Foucault and Lefebvre I think both do some very
interesting things by working Nietzsche and Heidegger with and against Hegel
and Marx - amongst others.
>We may want to situate Foucault's work within the development
>of Marxist accounts of civil society, ideology, or hegemony. A
>totalizing approach, even a totalizing Marxist approach, would exclude
>such claims on the grounds that they are reductive or neglect matters
>which are more important for the whole picture.
We should certainly be attentive to the links between Althusser, Gramsci,
etc. etc. and Foucault. It would be a productive dialogue. But I really
don't think we should underestimate the role Heidegger plays in Foucault's
work. To my mind it is far more subtle than is usually acknowledged. The
Letter is but one example. But Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics is
central to the secondary thesis on the Anthropology, and to Order of Things,
Heidegger's Nietzsche book is key, as is the Technology work for the notion
of dispositif. Etc. etc. When I went back and worked on Heidegger I found
that a number of Foucault's issues were strongly anticipated in H's work.
>
>What do you think about that distinction?
>
I'm not sure of the use of the distinction. I think there is a lot of
Foucault and X type studies, that tend to neglect the wider picture. The key
test to my mind, is not to say F got that idea from there, or that interest
from here, but to see how examining thinkers he found important illuminates
his work in a useful, practical way. In my work, I think that reading
Heidegger (and Nietzsche) makes Foucault's genealogy (thought of as
historical ontology) much more useful than the historical sociology type
appropriations (what i would call ontic history); equally what i call
Foucault's writing of spatial histories.
I am sure that Joe's reading of Foucault through an Althusserian lens has
helped him, and I expect i will learn from his work. As I said before, it's
not an either/or. But I am unsure that calling Foucault a structural
Marxist, or a Nietzschean, or - indeed - a Heideggerian ontologist is very
useful.
Best wishes
Stuart