Post-structuralism
and Discourse Analysis
Michel Foucault 1926-1984
"We must conceive
of power without the king".
We do not recognize
the will to truth as desire or power; this
is a function of our discourse itself. Only one truth appears before
us,
and we are unaware of the prodigious machinery of the will to truth,
with
its vocation of exclusion.
-Foucault
Biography:
- born in 1926,
Poiters, France
-trained as
philosopher, taught in Paris
-activist,
protested about prisoner's rights
-opposed
military dictatorship in Brazil, Tunisia
-supported
solidarity movement in Poland
-died in 1984,
complications of AIDS
Roots:
-Nietzsche's
belief that history is arbitrary
-existentialist
belief in "authentic" life, through possibility of creativity
-critical
theorist's belief that society is socially constructed to maintain
social order/status quo
Primary
thesis: in every society the production of discourse is at
once controlled, selected, organized and redistributed according to a
certain
number of procedures, whose role is "to avert its powers and its
dangers,
to cope with chance events, to evade its ponderous, awesome
materiality."
discourse:
ways of constituting knowledge, together with the
social practices, forms of subjectivity and power relations which
inhere
in such knowledges and relations between them. Discourses are more than
ways
of thinking and producing meaning. They constitute the 'nature' of the
body,
unconscious and conscious mind and emotional life of the subjects they
seek
to govern.
1 argues against
idea of Enlightenments that each person is autonomous, and
acts freely through use of reason.
2 reason
is not universal or outside of society, according to Foucault
3 instead all of
society/reality is mediated by its description in language
a.
different societies describe reality differently through
different grammatical rules/syntax of morality
b.
evidence of social construction is clear by contrasts
between different societies
4.. each person
is constituted as a subject within different institutional
discourses that determine rules of appropriate behavior
a.
"epistemes" are structures of knowledge that determine our experience
of world.
1. control individuals by use of "codes of meaning"
2. our concepts define our experience & how we
describe them & make meaning of them
b.
prison is dominant metaphor for how society controls citizens
1. ancient societies- deviant, criminal has body punished,
publicly to control population (external control)
2. modern societies- deviant/criminal has mind punishment,
privately, internalized controls
5. power
and control over each subject is exercised by discursive rules
a. principle of exclusion is used to discipline
1. normal vs deviant sstep
2. "normalizing discourses" teach ppl not to
deviate w/o punishment anti-smoking
b.
exercised through power to speak, rituals
1. who is allowed to have authority to decide
true/false
2. who is considered to be
'irrational'
c.
belief by subjects that they are under constant surveillance
of authority figures
1. Hume's "panoptican"
2. ppl self-discipline themselves as if police
were not there- police no longer necessary
c. modern
societies controlled through technology
1. ancient societies- faith/ideology/power of police
(Stalin)
2. modern, divided self can't fight effectively- efforts are
scattered
3. every person is a self-contradiction
(nexxus of different discourses)
6. Power
is synonymous with knowledge
a.
internalized by subjects, self-discipline
b.
science, mental institutions, financial institutions, churches,
bureaucracies, prisons, beauty, sports, hospitals, schools, etc.- all
construct
subjects differently
1. mutually contradictory ways, often
2. offers possibility of resistance, play off
contradictions
7. analyze the
history/archeology/geneology of discourses
a.
rules change through different eras
b.
proves that it is arbitrary/socially constructed
c.
presented as being universal/never-changing
d.
past interpretation is always written from present perspective
bi
1. works to reinforce social order/stop rebellion
2. an analysis of history is a way to open it
up to question hs
a. show it is "man-made"
b. potentially open to reinvention
c. always
written to advantage one group over another (unmask it)
-
my aim is most decidedly not to use the categories of cultural
totalities (whether world-views, ideal types, the particular spirit of
an age) in order to impose on history, despite itself, the forms of
structural analysis. The series described, the limits fixed, the
comparisons and correlations made are based not on the old philosophies
of history, but are intended to question teleologies and totalisations;
- in so far as my aim
is to define a method of historical analysis freed from the
anthropological theme, it is clear that the theory that I am about to
outline has a dual relation with the previous studies. It is an attempt
to formulate, in general terms (and not without a great deal of
rectification and elaboration), the tools that these studies have used
or forged for themselves in the course of their work. But, on the other
hand, it uses the results already obtained to define a method of
analysis purged of all anthropologism. The ground on which it rests is
the one that it has itself discovered. The studies of madness and the
beginnings of psychology, of illness and the beginnings of a clinical
medicine, of the sciences of life, language, and economics were
attempts that were carried out, to some extent, in the dark: but they
gradually became clear, not only because little by little their method
became more precise, but also because they discovered - in this debate
on humanism and anthropology - the point of its historical possibility.
8. not possible
to have monolithic, all-encompassing struggle like Marxists-
(grand narratives)
a.
no over-arching or totalizing conflict (class)
b.
multiples discourses operating simultaneously
1. sexual orientation, gender, race, age, class, health,
disability status, health, body image, etc.
2. any 'grand narrative' solution is just another discourse,
equally imprisoning
a.. ex. Russia- Soviet Union
b. Iran (1979) Shah, Khomeini
9. possibility
of ethical life found in situating yourself against the discursive
field/rules
a.
transgressions are a risk, resistance
b.
authenticity is found at boundaries- "where life is lived dangerously"
1. possibility of creativity
2. exposes construction of rules as artificial, not natural
3. create potentially a "new space", broadening of meaning
of 'normal' au
c. look to "difference" as a way of contesting these power relationships
1. ruptures & discontinuities reveal
socially constructed nature of natural
2. opens up the ability to question settled
meanings
10. reverse discourse- reinvent the meaning
a. queer nation, Code pink, NWA
b. humor, irony in the face of solemn truth
11. cultural becomes political, in terms of situating yourself against
power of status quo
a. those 'different' from 'normal' will be attacked
to keep power relations as they are
b. marginalized ppl have tremendous transformative
power milk
psa