Re: [Foucault-L] Gutting

I could be wrong, but the reference to Gutting's book was most likely his Michel Foucault's Archaeology of Scientific Reason, Cambridge University Press.

On Sep 23, 2007, at 9:00 AM, suniti sharma wrote:

Gutting's book is titled:
Foucault A Very Short Introduction
Oxford University Press

--- John narayan <thesignofthetimes@xxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

Hey Jared,

Tricky question that will no doubt get different
answers.

I am of the persuasion that there is a break in the
two methodologies;
mainly because I take archaeology to suffer from
issues it never gets
around. For example,

1) The relationship between the Discursive and
Non-Discursive (something I
think genealogy gets round via its focus on
practises).
2) The generality of the archives Foucault describes
and what could be
argued to be a return of a quasi-transcendental in
his own work.
3) The reflexivity and epistemological status of
Foucault's own
archaeologies.

You can see Foucault grappling with some of these
problems; for example, see
the English preface to the Order of Things and the
Archaeology of Knowledge.

On the other hand, other authors don’t see the above
problems in Archaeology
(I’m thinking of Gutting’s book but can’t remember
the title).

Foucault is pretty patchy on highlighting the
differences between the two
methods but the book I found most helpful was by
Todd May:

(1993), Between Genealogy and Epistemology:
Psychology, politics and
Knowledge in the Thought of Michel Foucault
(University Park, PA:
Pennsylvania Press)

I don’t know you familiarity level concerning
Foucault’s work, but if not
high, try reading May’s introduction to Foucault
beforehand, which does a
good job of introducing the differences whilst
stressing the continuity
between the two methods.

BTW, I would not get too bogged down in Foucault's
recasting of his own
project, it happens at various times throughout his
career. And roughly, the
works do all address the historical ontology of
ourselves that Foucault
denotes in What is Enlightenment.

John

From: "Jared Kennard" <jaredkennard@xxxxxxxxx>
Reply-To: Mailing-list <foucault-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: foucault-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [Foucault-L] Genealogy Archaeology Divide
Date: Sat, 22 Sep 2007 23:36:05 -0600

This question may seem a bit naive but I will ask

it anyway. I have been

doing some research on Foucault's genealogy and

archaeology and have come

to
the conclusion that in the course of his work the

latter is more or less

replaced by the former. I began my inquiry with

the understanding that the

early works of Foucault were conducted under a sort

of rubric of

archaeology, as he lays out in various places. It

seems, however, that he

finds this method unsatisfactory and moves to the

genealogical method

instead. My problem is that in stead of a clean

break or clear

differentiation between the two methodologies he

seems to simply recast his

works as works of genealogy instead of archaeology.

In the interview he

gave with Rabinow and Dreyfus entitled "On the

Genealogy of Ethics" he

states that: "three domains of genealogy are

possible," and that "all three

were present...in Madness and Civilization."

Furthermore, The Birth of the

Clinic and The Order of Things studied one of these

three axis, while

Discipline and Punish and History of Sexuality

Studied the other two. With

out getting into the specifics of what these three

possibilities are, since

that doesn't seem relevant to the problem at hand,

it does seem quite

obvious that he is brushing over earlier statements

he has made about his

early works being archaeology's; or perhaps he is

attempting to apply a

sort
of discursive eraser.

Ultimately my problem boils down to this: if what I

have said above is

correct than where, if anywhere, does he talk about

this move he has made?

Has archaeology been removed as an analytical tool

due to the problems this

methodology creates? And if so in what ways does

genealogy differ from its

predecessor? How is it that the genealogical form

can simply replace the

archaeological one?

Any help or suggestions would be greatly

appreciated.

Jared
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