Hi all - I agree with Phil that (if I may) 'to have'
Foucault is to be able 'to use' him. I really think
his work, his books, as 'experiences', have changed
the way I think, the things I look for; they have
enabled me to ask different questions (or such is the
claim of my dissertation).
I'm finding Paul Veyne, 'Foucault Revolutionizes
History' (in A. Davidson, ed., Foucault and his
Interlocuters), helpful in getting a picture of what
F's 'methods' consist in, and of how they can be
'applied'. It's only one more interpretation, of
course, but it's stimulating in its clarity.
Veyne discusses F's attention to 'practice', to 'what
people do', practices as as existing and explicable
(?) 'without presupposing any goal, object, material
cause (the governed masses, ralations of production,
an enduring State), or type of behavior ...
'Objects seem to determine our behavior, but our
practice determines its own objects in the first
place... [T]he object to which [the practice] applies
is what it is only in relation to that practice (in
the sense that 'beneficiary' is a beneficiary inasmuch
as I cause him or her to benefit from something...).
The relation determines the object, and only what is
determined exists.'
I'm working on the outlines of a 'genealogy of
legitimacy', and while I make no claims to its
profundity, I hope that Foucault's ideas completely
inhabit it. I'm puzzling right now over the
'objectivization' of legitimacy: it is spoken of as a
substance or quality, which of course could have no
'existence' absent its (conceptualization in)
discourse (the word legitimacy plus all that it is
attached to). But I am not at all settled on whether I
can treat 'it' as an 'object'. Veyne's commentary has
me thinking about the 'practice' of claiming (right?
status? warrant? 'legitimacy'?) - but what are the
objects that are determined in relation to such
claims? (Law? Rulers and ruled?) Or is the
relationship itself, that between rulers and ruled,
that is 'determined' as 'existing'? Seems to me that
such a relationship could be 'determined'
(objectivized) on the basis of other actually existing
practices; (would we have to presuppose, pace
Nietzsche, the prior existence of 'the stronger'?
Would that be a mistake?)
But this leaves me with a series: a practice (of
violence or force - Derrida's 'Force of Law'?) that
determines objects (rulers) that engage in a practice
(claiming) that determines an object (legitimacy).
Can anyone point to a series of this kind in
Foucault's work (lest I come to think his questions
have sent me regressing over the precipice)? I'd be
grateful for comments.
shane
2) Excavations and Dialogues:
Radical Theory and Politics at the Millennium
Edge Hill College, Lancashire, UK - 9th and 10th
September 2002
A Conference of : The Political Studies Association
Marxism Specialist Group - The Political Studies
Association Post-Structuralism and Radical Politics
Specialist Group - What's Left Group - Social
Movements Research Group of Edge Hill College
Plenary Speakers: Terrell Carver and Christopher
Norris
How can radical political theory help us analyse the
present conjuncture? What resources does it have to
understand contemporary democratic struggles and
conflicts? Increasingly, the theoretical oppositions,
rejections and intellectual ?turf wars? of the 1980s
and 1990s are giving way to a common desire on the
Left for a constructive re-engagement between
proponents of radical ideas, between Marxism,
Post-Marxism, Queer theory and Feminism, Postmodernism
and Poststructuralism. Whilst there remains profound
disagreement amongst these positions, there is a
growing sense that constructive debate over the
problems and prospects of radical theory and politics
can be more effective than fragmentation, dispersion
and mutual denunciation. Given the collapse of radical
thinking amongst mainstream parties of the left, the
triumph of market liberalism and containment of
dissent either by policing strategies, legal and
legislative concessions or strategies of
depoliticisation, the need for a vibrant theoretical
culture of the Left is now more than ever an
imperative. This conference will explore two distinct
dimensions of this theoretical re-engagement: the
critical excavation of existing theory and politics
through new thinking and critical perspectives, and
the engagement in critical dialogues between
contrasting positions in order to enrich contemporary
theory and politics. Both dimensions offer the
possibility of developing critical conceptual tools,
theoretical perspectives and political strategies for
the new Millennium.
Papers are invited that will assist this exploration
from any radical theoretical or political position. It
is anticipated that at least one publication will
issue from the conference. All enquiries/papers to:
Paul Reynolds CSSS, Edge Hill College St Helens Road
Ormskirk, Lancs L39 4QP Tel: 01695 584370
Reynoldp@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > from: Phil Ryan <pryan@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> > date: Fri, 09 Aug 2002 15:59:48
> > to: foucault@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > subject: Re: John P's questions
> >
> > John:
> >
> > You are making an interesting contribution to this
> list by posing apparently
> > simple questions that
> > help get people focussed on "Foucault 101" again.
> So thanks for that.
> >
> > By way of a quick answer to:
> >
> > > Did Foucault think others were capable of using
> his methods?
> >
> > A) On the one hand
> > Foucault stated "I write for users, not for
> readers" (D E II, 524), and liked
> > to refer to his work
> > as a "tool-box" (Ibid, 523), and to himself as a
> "seller of tools, a maker of
> > recipes [recettes]"
> > (720).
> >
> > B) On the other hand
> > He once offered the interesting comment that he
> would like his books to burn
> > themselves like
> > fireworks after having been read (Ibid., 725). I
> think he was pointing to the
> > nervousness that I
> > imagine any influential author feels at how their
> work will be used by others.
> > [I have a couple of
> > nice quotes from Weber lamenting how his
> "Protestant Ethic" was pressed into
> > service against
> > materialism; and we all know of Marx's "I am not a
> Marxist" statement.]
> >
> >
> > But what about:
> >
> > > Do you believe others are capable of it?
> >
> > Depends what you mean. There are many times I am
> working on something, and a
> > particular
> > insight or point of view on the topic comes that I
> don't think I would have
> > had without having
> > read Foucault. That, for me, is "using" Foucault,
> though perhaps you mean
> > something different.
> >
> > Phil
> >
> >
>
__________________________________________________
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from News and Sport to Email and Music Charts
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Foucault is to be able 'to use' him. I really think
his work, his books, as 'experiences', have changed
the way I think, the things I look for; they have
enabled me to ask different questions (or such is the
claim of my dissertation).
I'm finding Paul Veyne, 'Foucault Revolutionizes
History' (in A. Davidson, ed., Foucault and his
Interlocuters), helpful in getting a picture of what
F's 'methods' consist in, and of how they can be
'applied'. It's only one more interpretation, of
course, but it's stimulating in its clarity.
Veyne discusses F's attention to 'practice', to 'what
people do', practices as as existing and explicable
(?) 'without presupposing any goal, object, material
cause (the governed masses, ralations of production,
an enduring State), or type of behavior ...
'Objects seem to determine our behavior, but our
practice determines its own objects in the first
place... [T]he object to which [the practice] applies
is what it is only in relation to that practice (in
the sense that 'beneficiary' is a beneficiary inasmuch
as I cause him or her to benefit from something...).
The relation determines the object, and only what is
determined exists.'
I'm working on the outlines of a 'genealogy of
legitimacy', and while I make no claims to its
profundity, I hope that Foucault's ideas completely
inhabit it. I'm puzzling right now over the
'objectivization' of legitimacy: it is spoken of as a
substance or quality, which of course could have no
'existence' absent its (conceptualization in)
discourse (the word legitimacy plus all that it is
attached to). But I am not at all settled on whether I
can treat 'it' as an 'object'. Veyne's commentary has
me thinking about the 'practice' of claiming (right?
status? warrant? 'legitimacy'?) - but what are the
objects that are determined in relation to such
claims? (Law? Rulers and ruled?) Or is the
relationship itself, that between rulers and ruled,
that is 'determined' as 'existing'? Seems to me that
such a relationship could be 'determined'
(objectivized) on the basis of other actually existing
practices; (would we have to presuppose, pace
Nietzsche, the prior existence of 'the stronger'?
Would that be a mistake?)
But this leaves me with a series: a practice (of
violence or force - Derrida's 'Force of Law'?) that
determines objects (rulers) that engage in a practice
(claiming) that determines an object (legitimacy).
Can anyone point to a series of this kind in
Foucault's work (lest I come to think his questions
have sent me regressing over the precipice)? I'd be
grateful for comments.
shane
2) Excavations and Dialogues:
Radical Theory and Politics at the Millennium
Edge Hill College, Lancashire, UK - 9th and 10th
September 2002
A Conference of : The Political Studies Association
Marxism Specialist Group - The Political Studies
Association Post-Structuralism and Radical Politics
Specialist Group - What's Left Group - Social
Movements Research Group of Edge Hill College
Plenary Speakers: Terrell Carver and Christopher
Norris
How can radical political theory help us analyse the
present conjuncture? What resources does it have to
understand contemporary democratic struggles and
conflicts? Increasingly, the theoretical oppositions,
rejections and intellectual ?turf wars? of the 1980s
and 1990s are giving way to a common desire on the
Left for a constructive re-engagement between
proponents of radical ideas, between Marxism,
Post-Marxism, Queer theory and Feminism, Postmodernism
and Poststructuralism. Whilst there remains profound
disagreement amongst these positions, there is a
growing sense that constructive debate over the
problems and prospects of radical theory and politics
can be more effective than fragmentation, dispersion
and mutual denunciation. Given the collapse of radical
thinking amongst mainstream parties of the left, the
triumph of market liberalism and containment of
dissent either by policing strategies, legal and
legislative concessions or strategies of
depoliticisation, the need for a vibrant theoretical
culture of the Left is now more than ever an
imperative. This conference will explore two distinct
dimensions of this theoretical re-engagement: the
critical excavation of existing theory and politics
through new thinking and critical perspectives, and
the engagement in critical dialogues between
contrasting positions in order to enrich contemporary
theory and politics. Both dimensions offer the
possibility of developing critical conceptual tools,
theoretical perspectives and political strategies for
the new Millennium.
Papers are invited that will assist this exploration
from any radical theoretical or political position. It
is anticipated that at least one publication will
issue from the conference. All enquiries/papers to:
Paul Reynolds CSSS, Edge Hill College St Helens Road
Ormskirk, Lancs L39 4QP Tel: 01695 584370
Reynoldp@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > from: Phil Ryan <pryan@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> > date: Fri, 09 Aug 2002 15:59:48
> > to: foucault@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > subject: Re: John P's questions
> >
> > John:
> >
> > You are making an interesting contribution to this
> list by posing apparently
> > simple questions that
> > help get people focussed on "Foucault 101" again.
> So thanks for that.
> >
> > By way of a quick answer to:
> >
> > > Did Foucault think others were capable of using
> his methods?
> >
> > A) On the one hand
> > Foucault stated "I write for users, not for
> readers" (D E II, 524), and liked
> > to refer to his work
> > as a "tool-box" (Ibid, 523), and to himself as a
> "seller of tools, a maker of
> > recipes [recettes]"
> > (720).
> >
> > B) On the other hand
> > He once offered the interesting comment that he
> would like his books to burn
> > themselves like
> > fireworks after having been read (Ibid., 725). I
> think he was pointing to the
> > nervousness that I
> > imagine any influential author feels at how their
> work will be used by others.
> > [I have a couple of
> > nice quotes from Weber lamenting how his
> "Protestant Ethic" was pressed into
> > service against
> > materialism; and we all know of Marx's "I am not a
> Marxist" statement.]
> >
> >
> > But what about:
> >
> > > Do you believe others are capable of it?
> >
> > Depends what you mean. There are many times I am
> working on something, and a
> > particular
> > insight or point of view on the topic comes that I
> don't think I would have
> > had without having
> > read Foucault. That, for me, is "using" Foucault,
> though perhaps you mean
> > something different.
> >
> > Phil
> >
> >
>
__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Everything you'll ever need on one web page
from News and Sport to Email and Music Charts
http://uk.my.yahoo.com