Re: Power/Knowledge


Mark

Thanks for your comments. We may be able to divert the list for some time by
swapping counter-examples,and perhaps we will hear more views. I found this on
the web which might might support your case...
<<<
5- "A croire qu'ils (pouvoir/savoir) sont purement et simplement
interchangeables. Foucault montre par exemple que le concept de mesure chez les grecs
était tout à la fois, et dans le même mouvement, cet instrument de pouvoir qui
définissait le principe d'ordre auquel il fallait plier la cité, et cet
instrument du savoir qui servait de matrice aux sciences mathématiques... Que
"l'examen" de nos jours est à la fois principe de sélection, à l'école ou à l'usine, et
modèle théorique de la plupart des sciences humaines ... Taillés dans la même
étoffe, et l'un par l'autre pétris, c'est de manière indivise qu'il faut
penser le rapport du Savoir et du Pouvoir." Bernard-Henri Lévy, Magasine
littéraire, Juin 1975.
>>>
Here French hyphen becomes French slash (which Levy associates with 'simply
interchangeable!) and Foucault is about to be converted into Nouvelle
philosophie. But it turns out that he is giving a half reasonable paraphrase of the
early, 1972 College summary you mention. The way Foucault himself makes the point
about examen as pouvoir-savoir is I think slightly more nuanced by 1975. All
the uses, of course, are qualified or localised in some way: 'a'
pouvoir-savoir, forms of pouvoir-savoir, relations of pouvoir-savoir. Once you lose that
context the risk very quickly arises - as we know - of people thinking he is
just saying in general that power is knowledge and vice versa, or, which is also
wrong, that they form one thing. Which (I continue to contend) is something
that hyphens, but not slashes, can commonly be used and taken to convey. So in
the example of my own writing you cite against me, I think (!?) I used
'Leninist/Stalinist' rather than Leninist-Stalinist to avoid the obvious echo of
'Marxist-Leninist', which conventionally identifies to a unitary ideological p
osition; I wanted at that point to say a certain thought was Leninist and
Stalinist in equal and similar ways without affirming the identity or difference of
Leninism and Stalinism.

Trendier and sexier? Yes, probably guilty of some such calculations - but the
more serious intention was to signal that F oucault had something quite new
and arresting and particular to say about some old and familiar concepts. I
might have agonised a bit more if I'd guessed the book would still be in print
in 2004. The first publisher we took the project to said they didn't think it
was a book. Changing the subject - what about 'Abnormal'?

Colin










In a message dated 13/03/04 17:00:44 GMT Standard Time, mgekelly@xxxxxxxxxxx
writes:

> Subj: Re: Power/Knowledge
> Date: 13/03/04 17:00:44 GMT Standard Time
> From: mgekelly@xxxxxxxxxxx
> Reply-to: foucault@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> To: foucault@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Sent from the Internet
>
>
>
> Hi Colin
> Thanks for such a full explanation!
> I had actually just written a footnote condemning (what turns out to be)
> your translation with the argument that the slash implies interchangeability
> i.e. that it might mean either power or knowledge. An example of this use of
> the slash might be p.232 in your Power/Knowledge afterword, where you talk
> of "the Leninist/Stalinist strategic lore". Here this is the Leninist lore,
> which is also the Stalinist lore. Or the case of "his/her", where it could
> be his or it could be hers. Where pouvoir-savoir is used, it could not be
> either, nor indeed could it be both, because it is a neologism, as you point
> out. The hyphen, also in English, it seems to me, creates a new word which
> is not reducible to its constituent concepts, or indeed suggesting their
> identity. If anything, it seems to me, it is the slash which suggests that,
> as, perhaps, in your Leninism/Stalinism example. I cannot think of any
> examples of hyphenated phrases in English which do suggest identity -
> normally they are entirely novel concepts. My suspicion is that the slash
> was/is a lot trendier, hence looked sexier as the book title, as you
> indicate. I hope I'm not being too precocious!
> The pouvoir-savoir phrase incidentally goes back quite a long way - it's
> used in the 1972 College course summary so quite possibly was used in that
> course.
> Which is the lecture in which Foucault semi-renounces the concept, by the
> way?
>
> Mant thanks,
> Mark
>



Colin Gordon


Director, NHSIA Disease Management Systems Programme
Health Informatics Manager, Royal Brompton Hospital
Chair, British Medical informatics Society
http://www.bmis.org
07881 625146
colinngordon@xxxxxxx



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