Twenty-four years ago today, on June 25, 1984, Michel Foucault died in Paris, France. In an interview with Lé Magazine Littéraire, barely a month before his passing, Foucault remarked:
“The work of an intellectual is not to mould the political will of others; it is, through the analyses that he does in his own field, to re-examine evidence and assumptions, to shake up habitual ways of working and thinking, to dissipate conventional familiarities, to re-evaluate rules and institutions and to participate in the formation of a political will (where he has his role as citizen to play).”
—Michel Foucault, “The Concern for Truth”
I am reading Foucault’s “Abnormals” right now.
It’s about masturbators and monsters; he was going to talk about the delinquent as well, but ran out of time/
I’m a big fan of the next lecture series (right after Abnormal) which is Society Must Be Defended.
And, yes, Foucault DID run out of time. Our loss.
Sometimes I wonder if Foucault will be or is used by the system he worked against. I don’t hope so, but I think there is a large potential to use his thoughts for purposes he would’nt like to support. Maybe thats the problem with thinking of his work as a “toolbox”.
I really would like to know if Foucault already was used by people working in control- or prison area.