The Essential Foucault: Selections from the Essential Works of Foucault, 1954-1984

by Michel Foucault, Paul Rabinow (Editor), Nikolas Rose (Editor)

Few philosophers have had as significant an impact on contemporary thought as Michel Foucault. His complete uncollected writings, under the title Dits et écrits, were published in French in 1994 and in a three volume series from The New Press that brought the most important of these works—courses, articles, and interviews, many of them translated into English for the first time—to American readers. Now, Paul Rabinow and Nikolas Rose have collected the best pieces from the three-volume set into a one-volume anthology.

The Essential Foucault, which features a new and provocative introduction by Rabinow and Rose, is certain to become the standard text for all those interested in a comprehensive overview of Foucault’s thought.

Genres: Philosophy, Nonfiction, Politics, Sociology, Academic, History, France

496 pages, Paperback

First published August 22, 2003

About the author

Paul-Michel Foucault was a French philosopher, historian of ideas, writer, political activist, and literary critic. Foucault's theories primarily address the relationships between power and knowledge, and how they are used as a form of social control through societal institutions. Though often cited as a structuralist and postmodernist, Foucault rejected these labels. His thought has influenced academics, especially those working in communication studies, anthropology, psychology, sociology, criminology, cultural studies, literary theory, feminism, Marxism and critical theory.
Born in Poitiers, France, into an upper-middle-class family, Foucault was educated at the Lycée Henri-IV, at the École Normale Supérieure, where he developed an interest in philosophy and came under the influence of his tutors Jean Hyppolite and Louis Althusser, and at the University of Paris (Sorbonne), where he earned degrees in philosophy and psychology. After several years as a cultural diplomat abroad, he returned to France and published his first major book, The History of Madness (1961). After obtaining work between 1960 and 1966 at the University of Clermont-Ferrand, he produced The Birth of the Clinic (1963) and The Order of Things (1966), publications that displayed his increasing involvement with structuralism, from which he later distanced himself. These first three histories exemplified a historiographical technique Foucault was developing called "archaeology".
From 1966 to 1968, Foucault lectured at the University of Tunis before returning to France, where he became head of the philosophy department at the new experimental university of Paris VIII. Foucault subsequently published The Archaeology of Knowledge (1969). In 1970, Foucault was admitted to the Collège de France, a membership he retained until his death. He also became active in several left-wing groups involved in campaigns against racism and human rights abuses and for penal reform. Foucault later published Discipline and Punish (1975) and The History of Sexuality (1976), in which he developed archaeological and genealogical methods that emphasized the role that power plays in society.
Foucault died in Paris from complications of HIV/AIDS; he became the first public figure in France to die from complications of the disease. His partner Daniel Defert founded the AIDES charity in his memory.

Reviews

[Elliot · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some great interviews in this volume. I believe there is one interview, after François Mitterrand was elected, that demonstrates Foucault's commitment to socialist politics in an interesting way- with some interesting comments on the need for "optimal social coverage" secured through "an empiricism in which we must transform the field of social institutions into a field of experimentation."

[Ian · Rating 4 out of 5]

"What is an Author?"

[Shulamith Farhi · Rating 3 out of 5]

Only reviewing Omnes et Singulatim. The other essays are fine too, but the Tanner lecture is perhaps Foucault's best work. I will say more about it later.

[Karen Carlson]

Reading selected essays for Catherine Project reading group summer 2023-
https://catherineproject.org/offerings
June 9: “What is an Author?” (15pp)
 June 16: “Nietzsche, Genealogy, History” (19pp)
 June 23: “Subject and Power” (19pp)
 June 30: “Truth and Power” (19pp)
 July 7: “On the Genealogy of Ethics” (24pp)
These five essays were the texts for a brief Catherine Project group on Foucault. I had only vague knowledge of his work beforehand, so the group was enlightening as it covered a much wider range of ideas than I'd expected. The essays/interviews were, perhaps not surprisingly, quite relevant to contemporary issues: gender roles, identity, AI, power and subjectification, reconciling various views of history.
I'm not rating this since I'm not qualified. It wasn't an easy read, though the group was extremely helpful in that regard, but it was intriguing.
FMI see my blog post at A Just Recompense.

[Jeune Fille · Rating 5 out of 5]

you get so much more from foucault's letters and whatever he writes in the first person because he is so much more sassy and compelling.

my favorite chunk of this book is "Lives of Infamous Men," which if you are a freak like me and love Wisconsin Death Trip and @sheboyganscan (http://favstar.fm/users/sheboyganscan... will get a lot out of. He takes small bullets of information from documents concerning random, lost-to-history criminals in the 1700s and brings them back to life, illustrating how people who make small rackets in their lives draw the attention of Power, which kills them but also in this weird way makes them eternal.

here are two excerpts from "lives of infamous men":

"we may amuse ourselves, if we wish, by seeing a revenge in this: the chance that enabled these absolutely undistinguished people to emerge from their place amid the dead multitudes, to gesticulate again, to manifest their rage, their affliction, or the invincible determination to err- perhaps it makes up for the bad luck the brought power's lightning bolt down upon them, in spite of their modesty and anonymity."

skeletons rising to gesticulate! "out of the graves and into the streets."

"Malthurin Milan, place in the hospital of Charenton, 31 August 1707: "His madness was always to hide from his family, to lead an obscure life in he country, to have actions at law, to lend usuriously and without security, to lead his feeble mind down unknown paths, and believe himself capable of the greatest employments."

^that's me, right??

[Empire · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the greatest thinkers of the 20th century because of his unconventional way of analyzing the subjects he approaches. In this book you can find some of his most important concepts. It is composed by multiple chapters, which is good because you can read a chapter and then put the book back into your library and whenever you feel like to read some Foucault you can just read a random chapter.

[Brandon · Rating 5 out of 5]

I like how he talks about the way that we constantly look back on our history of science. He explains nicely how this retroactive assignment of truth-hood or false-hood on scientific theories is a sticky game to play. I look forward to getting more into it.

[Ryan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I also picked this book up today. I gave it five stars because of the breadth of work it collects, especially the essay "What is Critique," which I think is an important work.

[Curtis · Rating 3 out of 5]

More early start to Spring semester.

[Gizella Czene]

It's just a taste but I love his thinking.

[Alison · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dissapointingly shitty introduction, but the interviews are grand.

[Mills College Library]

194 F762es 2003