Месяц: Сентябрь 2015

SUBJECTIVITY, ‘REASON’ AND NEUTRALITY

Feminists have found Foucault’s critique of liberal humanism not only crucial in terms of recognising the flawed conception of the human subject which characterised Enlightenment thought, but also in his overturning of the objectivity of such thought. Feminist pluralists challenge the claims to universality, value neutrality, impartiality and objectivity of knowledge characteristic of liberal humanism, […]

RESISTANCE

Foucault’s primary concern in a great deal of his work has not been power as such, but the development of an analytical approach to the subject. In ‘The Subject and Power’ (1982), he begins by stating that the goal of his work has not been to analyse ‘the phenomena of power, but rather to create […]

POWER, FEMINISM AND FOUCAULT

There are a number of tensions in feminism’s engagement with the Foucauldian conceptualisation of the operation of power. Because power in Foucault can be conceptualised as ever-changing, generating points of intensity, it can also be seen as generating points of resistance. While many forms of feminism are committed to an organisation of the mass of […]

Managing Pain

One of the most unpleasant aspects of many chronic diseases is pain. Pain is disruptive, saps energy, negatively affects quality of life, and can lead to an ever-intensifying cycle of pain, anxiety, and anguish. Pain is also one of the most common complaints of older adults, and does not necessarily reflect the same things as […]

The end of legal discipline

By 1750 most forms of consensual sex outside marriage had drifted beyond the reach of the law. This was a development that could not have been foreseen in 1700, let alone a hundred years earlier, for it overturned some of the longest-established moral and legal principles in English history. Until the later nineteenth century there […]

Towards a Practice-based Theory

In the final analysis, categoricalism can recognize power but deletes from its analysis the element of practical politics: choice, doubt, strategy, planning, error and transformation. The ‘battle of the sexes’ comedy in traditional popular culture is a vision of sexual politics with just this kind of deletion. From one year to the next husbands err, […]