With regards to Discipline and Punish, I think it would only be worth
pointing out that in the translations of Foucault's footnotes to this book,
he says that he is only interesting in detailing the birth of the prison in
France, as doing a study of the differences in developments of the prison
across the West would be too burdensome for his specific project at hand.
On Sat, Dec 13, 2008 at 6:24 PM, David McInerney <vagabond@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> The point Foucault was making was quite simple. His knowledge was
> limited to the "West" ... but I'd say that, like most French
> intellectuals, he took France as typical of "the West" and just
> generalized from the French experience. This is quite evident in
> Discipline and Punish, for example.
>
> I don't think you can blame him for not extending his analysis to,
> say, Cambodia. You can use and extend his conceptual apparatus to
> analyze those countries that are not "Western". But what you can
> point out as a shortcoming of Foucault's work is that it does not
> explore how images of "the East" are constitutive of this category of
> "the West" and thus lend an imaginary homogeneity to what he claims
> as his own object ... it is that procedure that enables him to ignore
> both "the East" and the differences within "the West" ...
>
> So postcolonialism can have something to say about Foucault, if it
> turns from his "neglect" of the empires and considers how Foucault
> ignores the effects of images of the Other in constituting "the West"
> as a seemingly coherent object of analysis.
>
> Also postcolonial studies using Foucault's conceptual apparatus can
> lead to revision of Foucault's periodization and historical accounts
> of the discourses that he analyzes, given that many of them in fact
> originated in colonial situations ... e.g. see Ann Laura Stoler's work
>
> I hope this makes sense.
>
>
> On 14/12/2008, at 10:36 AM, Chetan Vemuri wrote:
>
> >
> > haha
> > i love the irony
> > no way is this the happiest season of the year.
> > especially for us non-christians.
> >
> >
> > Yeah, Foucault did say in a Japanese lecture that his case studies
> > were
> > specific to european contexts and would not necessarily be
> > applicable to
> > societies like Japan, China, India etc. But he did feel that his
> > methods
> > could be of use outside of the West.
> >
> >
> >
> > On Sat, Dec 13, 2008 at 5:25 PM, Kaelin Alexander <
> > kaelin.alexander@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> >
> >> Thomas (and Chetan),
> >>
> >> One could also make the argument (which Halperin does) that
> >> Foucault's
> >> overall emphasis on the discursive formation of sexuality already
> >> points
> >> and
> >> admits to the limits of his stated analysis, while also pointing
> >> towards
> >> the
> >> usefulness of his methodology in looking at discursive sexual
> >> practices in
> >> other time time periods, and outside the West.
> >>
> >> While this sort of thing could easily become a kind of navel-gazing
> >> claim--"But are we ever discursive enough?"--and sometimes it
> >> *does, *a
> >> work
> >> that takes this sort of methodology up fairly well is William
> >> Naphy's *Born
> >> to be Gay.* The title here is very misleading, so please don't
> >> read too far
> >> into it. It's a nice, well-researched survey of sexual practices
> >> on a more
> >> global scale--going back, I think to Sumeria. It's better as an
> >> introductory
> >> work which points towards *other* texts, but it's still quite
> >> informative
> >> and highly readable.
> >>
> >> Apologies for my rather clipped earlier response. It's definitely
> >> that time
> >> of year. "Hap, Happiest Season of All" my foot. Haha.
> >>
> >> Best,
> >>
> >> Kaelin Alexander
> >> Graduate Student
> >> Cornell University
> >> Department of English
> >>
> >> On Sat, Dec 13, 2008 at 6:12 PM, Thomas Lord <lord@xxxxxxx> wrote:
> >>
> >>> On Sat, 2008-12-13 at 17:36 -0500, Kaelin Alexander wrote:
> >>>> Chetan,
> >>>>
> >>>> Short answer: No.
> >>>>
> >>>> Long answer: Read Halperin's *Saint Foucault.*
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> Perhaps one of the real scholars can fill in my
> >>> memory on something I half remember: there's a
> >>> piece by Foucault or a transcript of a conversation
> >>> where he talks about the application of his ideas
> >>> outside the west. I don't recall whether he talked
> >>> about History of Sexuality specifically or not but
> >>> he did make sort of overarching (his whole program)
> >>> statements to the effect he was analyzing specific
> >>> cases and yes those cases were all in what one
> >>> could informally call "the West" and that while
> >>> his mode of analysis had applicability elsewhere
> >>> his historical narrative did not. Does that
> >>> ring any bells?
> >>>
> >>> -t
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> _______________________________________________
> >>> Foucault-L mailing list
> >>>
> >> _______________________________________________
> >> Foucault-L mailing list
> >>
> >
> >
> >
> > --
> > Chetan Vemuri
> > West Des Moines, IA
> > aryavartacnsrn@xxxxxxxxx
> > (515)-418-2771
> > "You say you want a Revolution! Well you know, we all want to
> > change the
> > world"
> > _______________________________________________
> > Foucault-L mailing list
>
> _______________________________________________
> Foucault-L mailing list
>
--
Chetan Vemuri
West Des Moines, IA
aryavartacnsrn@xxxxxxxxx
(515)-418-2771
"You say you want a Revolution! Well you know, we all want to change the
world"
pointing out that in the translations of Foucault's footnotes to this book,
he says that he is only interesting in detailing the birth of the prison in
France, as doing a study of the differences in developments of the prison
across the West would be too burdensome for his specific project at hand.
On Sat, Dec 13, 2008 at 6:24 PM, David McInerney <vagabond@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> The point Foucault was making was quite simple. His knowledge was
> limited to the "West" ... but I'd say that, like most French
> intellectuals, he took France as typical of "the West" and just
> generalized from the French experience. This is quite evident in
> Discipline and Punish, for example.
>
> I don't think you can blame him for not extending his analysis to,
> say, Cambodia. You can use and extend his conceptual apparatus to
> analyze those countries that are not "Western". But what you can
> point out as a shortcoming of Foucault's work is that it does not
> explore how images of "the East" are constitutive of this category of
> "the West" and thus lend an imaginary homogeneity to what he claims
> as his own object ... it is that procedure that enables him to ignore
> both "the East" and the differences within "the West" ...
>
> So postcolonialism can have something to say about Foucault, if it
> turns from his "neglect" of the empires and considers how Foucault
> ignores the effects of images of the Other in constituting "the West"
> as a seemingly coherent object of analysis.
>
> Also postcolonial studies using Foucault's conceptual apparatus can
> lead to revision of Foucault's periodization and historical accounts
> of the discourses that he analyzes, given that many of them in fact
> originated in colonial situations ... e.g. see Ann Laura Stoler's work
>
> I hope this makes sense.
>
>
> On 14/12/2008, at 10:36 AM, Chetan Vemuri wrote:
>
> >
> > haha
> > i love the irony
> > no way is this the happiest season of the year.
> > especially for us non-christians.
> >
> >
> > Yeah, Foucault did say in a Japanese lecture that his case studies
> > were
> > specific to european contexts and would not necessarily be
> > applicable to
> > societies like Japan, China, India etc. But he did feel that his
> > methods
> > could be of use outside of the West.
> >
> >
> >
> > On Sat, Dec 13, 2008 at 5:25 PM, Kaelin Alexander <
> > kaelin.alexander@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> >
> >> Thomas (and Chetan),
> >>
> >> One could also make the argument (which Halperin does) that
> >> Foucault's
> >> overall emphasis on the discursive formation of sexuality already
> >> points
> >> and
> >> admits to the limits of his stated analysis, while also pointing
> >> towards
> >> the
> >> usefulness of his methodology in looking at discursive sexual
> >> practices in
> >> other time time periods, and outside the West.
> >>
> >> While this sort of thing could easily become a kind of navel-gazing
> >> claim--"But are we ever discursive enough?"--and sometimes it
> >> *does, *a
> >> work
> >> that takes this sort of methodology up fairly well is William
> >> Naphy's *Born
> >> to be Gay.* The title here is very misleading, so please don't
> >> read too far
> >> into it. It's a nice, well-researched survey of sexual practices
> >> on a more
> >> global scale--going back, I think to Sumeria. It's better as an
> >> introductory
> >> work which points towards *other* texts, but it's still quite
> >> informative
> >> and highly readable.
> >>
> >> Apologies for my rather clipped earlier response. It's definitely
> >> that time
> >> of year. "Hap, Happiest Season of All" my foot. Haha.
> >>
> >> Best,
> >>
> >> Kaelin Alexander
> >> Graduate Student
> >> Cornell University
> >> Department of English
> >>
> >> On Sat, Dec 13, 2008 at 6:12 PM, Thomas Lord <lord@xxxxxxx> wrote:
> >>
> >>> On Sat, 2008-12-13 at 17:36 -0500, Kaelin Alexander wrote:
> >>>> Chetan,
> >>>>
> >>>> Short answer: No.
> >>>>
> >>>> Long answer: Read Halperin's *Saint Foucault.*
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> Perhaps one of the real scholars can fill in my
> >>> memory on something I half remember: there's a
> >>> piece by Foucault or a transcript of a conversation
> >>> where he talks about the application of his ideas
> >>> outside the west. I don't recall whether he talked
> >>> about History of Sexuality specifically or not but
> >>> he did make sort of overarching (his whole program)
> >>> statements to the effect he was analyzing specific
> >>> cases and yes those cases were all in what one
> >>> could informally call "the West" and that while
> >>> his mode of analysis had applicability elsewhere
> >>> his historical narrative did not. Does that
> >>> ring any bells?
> >>>
> >>> -t
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> _______________________________________________
> >>> Foucault-L mailing list
> >>>
> >> _______________________________________________
> >> Foucault-L mailing list
> >>
> >
> >
> >
> > --
> > Chetan Vemuri
> > West Des Moines, IA
> > aryavartacnsrn@xxxxxxxxx
> > (515)-418-2771
> > "You say you want a Revolution! Well you know, we all want to
> > change the
> > world"
> > _______________________________________________
> > Foucault-L mailing list
>
> _______________________________________________
> Foucault-L mailing list
>
--
Chetan Vemuri
West Des Moines, IA
aryavartacnsrn@xxxxxxxxx
(515)-418-2771
"You say you want a Revolution! Well you know, we all want to change the
world"