Foucault, Feminism, and the Self

Human studies, 2005

This paper offers a detailed account of Foucault's ethical and political notion of individuality as presented in his late work, and discusses its relationship to the feminist project of the theory of sexual difference. I argue that Foucault's elaboration of the classical ethos of "care for the self" opens the way for regarding the "I-woman" as an ethical, political and aesthetic self-creation. However, it has significant limitations that cannot be ignored. I elaborate on two aspects of Foucault's avoidance of sexual difference as a relevant category for an account of political and ethical individuality, which thus implicitly associates individual agency with men. I argue that Foucault implicitly assumes the existence of an ontological desire to become engaged in political self-creation. However, the ethical position of self-knowledge and desire should be understood as a contingent option that depends on material and historical conditions for its realization. Hence, I argue that a feminist reworking of Foucault's notion of political individuality should add a substantial ethical condition to the imperative of self-knowledge and self-creation -making possible the desiring woman subject.

mobixweb.net

In this article we highlight some aspects of Foucault's work that are useful for analyzing the processes of subjective production and relations of power marked by gender, understood as dispositifs. Feminist theories and practices offer fundamental resources both for the development of the Foucauldian perspective itself, and for the analysis and transformation of power relations. In relation to the tension between power and freedom, we highlight the importance of two issues: first, the intermediate space between states of domination and power relations-a distinction established by Foucault-which makes possible a more precise consideration of the dispositif of gender as well as its transformation; second, the relation between practices of the self and power relations, which makes it possible to identify the conditions of possibility for the exercise of resistance and freedom.

Foucault Studies, 2013

Michel Foucault died nearly thirty years ago, in 1984. He enjoyed widespread intellectual celebrity in France, and, towards the end of his life, in the United States, but his influence on the emerging field of feminist studies was minimal until well after his death. This is noteworthy only because of his overt queerness and engagement with radical politics during his life; Foucault quickly became the most influential twentieth century commentator on the politics of sexuality, yet his grasp of feminist politics seems tenuous, and his overt pronouncements, as well as the tacit implications of his writing, have long been labelled sexist. On the other hand, there is by now an enormous literature that takes up the implications of his work for feminism, without worrying too much about whether Foucault would have approved. The field has matured, in other words, and still has potential: the relatively long delay between Foucault's death and the publication of his lectures (and various ephemeral essays, speeches, and interviews) as well as the even longer interval in getting all this work translated into English means that the reception of his ideas in 2013 still feels ongoing, open to debate, and unresolved.

Foucault Studies

Michel Foucault died nearly thirty years ago, in 1984. He enjoyed widespread intellectual celebrity in France, and, towards the end of his life, in the United States, but his influence on the emerging field of feminist studies was minimal until well after his death. This is noteworthy only because of his overt queerness and engagement with radical politics during his life; Foucault quickly became the most influential twentieth century commentator on the politics of sexuality, yet his grasp of feminist politics seems tenuous, and his overt pronouncements, as well as the tacit implications of his writing, have long been labelled sexist. On the other hand, there is by now an enormous literature that takes up the implications of his work for feminism, without worrying too much about whether Foucault would have approved. The field has matured, in other words, and still has potential: the relatively long delay between Foucault's death and the publication of his lectures (and various ephemeral essays, speeches, and interviews) as well as the even longer interval in getting all this work translated into English means that the reception of his ideas in 2013 still feels ongoing, open to debate, and unresolved.

In this article we highlight some aspects of Foucault’s work that are useful for analyzing the processes of subjective production and relations of power marked by gender, understood as a dispositifs. Feminist theories and practices offer fundamental resources for both the development of the foucaldian perspective itself, and for the analysis and transformation of power relations. In relation to the tension between power and freedom, we highlight the importance of two issues: first, the intermediate space between states of domination and power relations -- a distinction established by Foucault -- which makes possible a more precise consideration of the dispositif of gender as well as its transformation. Second, the relation between practices of the self and power relations, which makes it possible to identify the conditions of possibility for the exercise of resistance and freedom. KEYWORDS: Gender, power, subject, feminism

Foucault Studies, 2009

In her 1985 essay attacking Foucault’s discourse on power, Toril Moi begins: “What could be more seductive for feminists than a discourse which, like that of Michel Foucault in La volonté de savoir, focuses on the complex interaction of power and sexuality? …it has after all been feminism which persistently has presented sex and sexuality as a question of power” (95). Indeed, Foucault’s work on disciplinary power in modern Western society has intrigued feminist scholars, who focus on the question of power relations between sexes. And yet, as many feminists have noted, Foucault fails to include gender in his analyses of the discourses of power, he fails to recognize that one sex is subjugated in relation to the other, and he fails to realize his own investment in a discourse that privileges a male point of view even as he analyzes the deployment of sexuality. Finally, much of his work seems to provide little room for agency or resistance, since the subject is constituted through discourses of power. I examine the question of whether a theory which forecloses agency of a subject that is sexed, subjugated, and continuously formed within discourses of power can be deployed in a feminist theory of resistance, beyond examinations of subjectivity and ontological study. I believe that Foucault’s theory of power, while sometimes problematic, is relevant for an analysis of gender oppression and also for a theory of resistance that moves beyond the language of sovereign rights.

Feminist Studies, 1994

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

2005

By developing a Foucauldian understanding of the self, queer theorists may remodel conceptions of selfhood such that forms of questioning identity, the body, coalitions, and recognition, which have presently arrived at an impasse, are opened to new lines of analysis. Foucault's use of "self' seems to reintroduce a model of selfhood that appears transhistorical, universal, disembodied, autopoietic, and associated with interioritya model of selfhood Foucault would likely attempt to transgress. However, against several critics, this thesis argues that while the self appears problematic in Foucault's writings, his analysis of ethics may be less problematically read. "Self' functions in these works to denote embodied, reflexive actions, which are both socially mediated and practiced. As such, the model of the self which Foucault establishes eludes the various traps laid out above, and opens a new path for confronting some key problems facing queer theory today.

This essay will contend that there is an inseparable triumvirate foundation in the construction of female bodies within contemporary society: women's bodies are constructed "naturally" as feminine; this derives from the sex category; and that this functionalises women as inherently sexualised. This will be illuminated by discussing the underpinning Foucauldian theories of power, discourse and bodily projections. Criticisms of this conception -and what it means for feminism -will be briefly dealt with, before examining and locating these forces in practice. An examination of regulative discourses and how they operate in society (constructing sex as gendered, sexualised modality) will take place; along with analysis on how this discursive regulation erects a false sexed dichotomy, and how this results in the heteronormative sexualisation of women as a category. The impact of such sexed centralised sexualisation will be elucidated upon, with reference to the constraining and debilitating results on body characteristics, geography, perceptions of self and political emancipation. This will be used to support the contention that maintenance of a naturalised, sexed dichotomy obliquely restricts a change in our social discursive context; and that it implicitly renders voiceless those outside of such binary categories. Furthermore, it will be argued that affirmation of such binary domains serve only to facilitate assumptions -and that in our current context, these assumptions are conducive to and justify covert, oppressive gender inequality and discrimination: ultimately necessitating the need for only one category -that of human.