A Foucault Primer

Who are we today? That deceptively simple question continued to be asked by the French historian and philosopher, Michel Foucault, who for the last three decades has had a profound influence on English-speaking scholars in the humanities and social sciences. This primer is designed for undergraduates and others who feel in need of some assistance when coming to grips with Foucault’s voluminous and complex writings. The book begins with an exposition and critique of Foucault’s “counter-history of ideas” in relation to Marxist theory, structural linguistics and the history of ideas. Instead of dealing with Foucault’s writings chronologically, however, this book is organized around some of their central concepts, and primarily with Foucault’s rethinking of the categories of “discourse”, “power” and “the subject” (or “subjection”). Whereas some commentators identify distinct phases in Foucault’s work, the authors believe that all of it contributes collectively - albeit in different ways - to what Foucault himself calls “an ontology of the present”. Furthermore, it is argued that Foucault’s historical research was always geared towards showing how things could have been (and still could be) other than they are. And this is especially the case with regard to the production of human subjects.