In the first few chapters of Part IV “Archeological Description” of his larger work The Archeology of Knowledge, Foucault sets out to better clarify his notion of ‘archeology’ as a new form of analysis which challenges traditional methodologies in the study (and even the basic conceptualization) of history as we have come to presently know it. Foucault points out various faults that he finds in this traditional methodology, which he refers to as “the history of ideas,” with a particular focus on the central issue of “the division of discourse into great unities (135).” His initial suggestion of a new approach to analysis through ‘archeology,’ a practicing of a “different history,” is then followed by a process of differentiating it from the traditional “history of ideas,” characterized by a focus on the “great themes” of “genesis, totality, [and] totalization,” which he claims continues to be perpetuated in “an age no longer made for it (138).” He precedes this process of differentiation by clearly asking the question he would otherwise have certainly encountered by others critically reviewing his work: “What can ‘archeology’ offer that other descriptions are unable to provide (136)?”
In an attempt to provide an overview of the differences that he lays out between the two methodologies (that is, between the traditional “history of ideas” and Foucault’s proposed ‘archeology’,) I will briefly summarize first the 4 main points establishing what Archeology is not (so as to better elucidate what it in fact is, but also the elements that make it particularly distinct from those problematic elements of the ‘history of ideas’ to which he is challenging.)
1. ‘Archeology’ is not defining “thoughts…images…themes [;etc]…” within discourses, “but the discourses themselves, those discourses as practices obeying certain rules (138).” Discourse is not to be understood as a document, but rather as a monument. Archeological analysis is not interpretive, “seek[ing] another better-hidden discourse,” and is not allegorical (139).
2. ‘Archeology’ does not involve working through some notion of a time-line, with an understanding of discourse based on precedents, origins, or destinations ;etc, but involves “defin[ing] discourses in their specificity (139).”
3. In ‘archeology,’ the ‘oeuvre’ doesn’t matter. “The authority of the creative subject, as the raison d’être of an oeuvre and the principle of its unity, is quite alien to it (139).”
4. In ‘archeology,’ the origin is of no concern. “It is not a return to the innermost secret of the origin, it is the systematic description of a discourse-object (140).”
Foucault, Michel. "Archeology and the History of Ideas." The Archeology of Knowledge and The Discourse on Language. New York: Harper and Row, 1972.
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
The Statement and "the Rule of Repeatable Materiality"
In chapter 2, “the Enunciative Function,” of Part III “the Statement and the Archive” from his work The Archeology of Knowledge, Foucault outlines four conditions of the ‘enunciative function’ to further explain the “special mode of existence” characteristic of what he calls the ‘statement (88).’ The last of these conditions that received attention within the chapter is that of materiality. Foucault states this material existence as a necessary condition in order for any series of signs or body of successive linguistic elements to be analyzed as a statement largely because the “material status of the statement are part of its intrinsic characteristics (100).”
This focus on materiality of the statement becomes even more interesting when one might be thinking in terms of the transmutability of the statement. When one thinks of more common conceptions of “the statement” (I’m reaching outside of Foucault’s definition here), the term connotes something that is rather solid and unshifting. Foucault’s ‘statement,’ however, “must have a substance, a support, a place, and a date [and] when these requisites change, it [the statement] too changes identity (101).” As such, a statement cannot be repeated in a similar manner in which an enunciation is “an unrepeatable event” in that “it has situated and dated uniqueness that is irreducible (101).” This automatically makes me think of contemporary society in which information travels at the speed of light and the ability to reproduce statements is not only easy but also within the capacity of individuals from multiple levels of society, a possibility due largely to newer media forms enabled by the emergence of computers and the widespread accessibility of the internet. For example, how might a statement change when communicated or enacted through different mediums of communication and dispersal. How do statements change as the contexts from which they are experienced shift?
Soon after considering this, I encountered what Foucault terms the “rule of repeatable materiality” in which statements may be the same, for example, in multiple printings of the same edition of a book despite the minute differences in each material object printed. Even further, however, the form which communicates a statement may also vary in its precise nature (a poster version of a statement that is also printed in a book) without necessarily requiring that this other form be read as an entirely different statement as “the materiality of the statement is not defined by the space occupied or the date of its formation; but rather its status as a thing or object...[it] cannot be identified with a fragment of matter; but its identity varies with a complex set of material institutions…it defines possibilities of reinscription and transcription (102-3).”
So in our world of reproduction, a statement may maintain its identity despite multiple copies of itself, even in various formats. Still there is a point in which the statement, in its reproduction or placement in certain contexts, must be understood as something different, perhaps, from its original engendering or enactment. Foucault elaborates on this quality through the notion of a particular “field of stabilization” enjoyed by statement which “makes it possible, despite all the differences of enunciation, to repeat them in their identity (103).” However, he states that this same field may also “define a threshold beyond which there can be no further equivalence, and the appearance of a new statement must be recognized (103).” For example, although a certain statement encountered in a book may maintain its identity in a copy of that statement which takes its form in a poster, if that poster also included other elements such as a poster brand or a “this printing made possible by the American League of White Supremacists” caption, the statement may become something different or may even be demolished in its entirety and replaced by a new statement as a kind of appropriation of the statement which might serve to debunk its initial conception or identity. If the identity of the statement “is itself relative and oscillates according to the use that is made of the statement and the way in which it is handled,” what might be said, for example, of the different statements that might be identified from an 8th grade American History textbook’s presentation of the declaration of independence, a pocket sized Declaration of Independence provided free to legal citizens of the United States by the government, a recitation of the Declaration of Independence at an NRA meeting; etc (104). This way of viewing the statement may also be of use when looking at acts of cultural subversion, either in performance, or, for example, in acts of culture jamming.
Foucault, Michel. "The Enunciative Function." The Archeology of Knowledge and The Discourse on Language. New York: Harper and Row, 1972.
Thursday, February 12, 2009
The Politics of Retrospection
The Archeology of Knowledge represents Foucault’s attempt to more clearly explain and delineate his particular approach to exploring the historical subject as performed in his earlier works including Madness and Civilization, Birth of the Clinic, and The Order of Things. As he states that his endeavor in these works was unclear, “a very imperfect sketch (15),” Archeology of Knowledge is the answer to the confusion and conceptual blurriness that he acknowledged in those works preceding it. In his introduction and first few chapters, Foucault makes his critical focus on traditions of historical analysis clear, acknowledging an array of problems that he sees with the methodological field of history.
One of his main points that I would like to further discuss is that of the politics of retrospection. In his introduction, Foucault states that “historical descriptions are necessarily ordered by the present state of knowledge (5).” In addition, and perhaps more explicitly stated in his first chapter “The Unities of Discourse,” “after all, ‘literature’ and ‘politics’ are recent categories, which can be applied to Medieval culture, or even classical literature, only by a retrospective hypothesis (22, emphasis added).” According to Foucault, it is important to be cognizant of the present position one might hold when looking into the past with a critical eye or upon viewing past events or practices through a conceptual lens whose very crafting is due to a particular notion of history defined simultaneously by a streamlined continuity (everything is connected, here is the origin, which explains this development which influenced this and so forth and so on until we arrive at our present moment) and by the breaking up into parts (for example of eras) with relatively precise points of origin and points of expiration. For example, in looking at a particular societal practice based on monuments from a distant past in remaining availability in the present day (“monuments,” which Foucault argues that traditional historical methodology turns into “documents” to then be organized, “divid[ed]…distribute[ed]” ;etc (6)) the viewer, from her position in a present day moment imposes, in a sense, a particular understanding of that practice and its meaning based on certain notions that have come to be naturalized to a certain extent due to their presentation as the end of a longer rope whose concept is thought of as having been consistently existent from some historical origin in time. For example, even the notion of looking at monuments to discover something about a “societal” practice suggests an imposition of a concept of “society” and what that might mean. One might even extend this problem found within historical methodology to that of cross-cultural criticism. For example, upon attempting to “read” the practices of another culture, even from a shared point in time, one must be cognizant of ones assumptions of certain universalities, such as a certain moral or ethical code; etc.
How does he propose one might respond to this problem that tends to be overlooked or unacknowledged? He states that a “precaution must be taken to disconnect the unquestioned continuities by which we organize, in advance, the discourse that we are to analyze (25).” He continues further:
And once again, particularly drawing attention to the potential accessing and making visible those practices which otherwise remain invisible (especially in terms of cross-cultural readings):
One of his main points that I would like to further discuss is that of the politics of retrospection. In his introduction, Foucault states that “historical descriptions are necessarily ordered by the present state of knowledge (5).” In addition, and perhaps more explicitly stated in his first chapter “The Unities of Discourse,” “after all, ‘literature’ and ‘politics’ are recent categories, which can be applied to Medieval culture, or even classical literature, only by a retrospective hypothesis (22, emphasis added).” According to Foucault, it is important to be cognizant of the present position one might hold when looking into the past with a critical eye or upon viewing past events or practices through a conceptual lens whose very crafting is due to a particular notion of history defined simultaneously by a streamlined continuity (everything is connected, here is the origin, which explains this development which influenced this and so forth and so on until we arrive at our present moment) and by the breaking up into parts (for example of eras) with relatively precise points of origin and points of expiration. For example, in looking at a particular societal practice based on monuments from a distant past in remaining availability in the present day (“monuments,” which Foucault argues that traditional historical methodology turns into “documents” to then be organized, “divid[ed]…distribute[ed]” ;etc (6)) the viewer, from her position in a present day moment imposes, in a sense, a particular understanding of that practice and its meaning based on certain notions that have come to be naturalized to a certain extent due to their presentation as the end of a longer rope whose concept is thought of as having been consistently existent from some historical origin in time. For example, even the notion of looking at monuments to discover something about a “societal” practice suggests an imposition of a concept of “society” and what that might mean. One might even extend this problem found within historical methodology to that of cross-cultural criticism. For example, upon attempting to “read” the practices of another culture, even from a shared point in time, one must be cognizant of ones assumptions of certain universalities, such as a certain moral or ethical code; etc.
How does he propose one might respond to this problem that tends to be overlooked or unacknowledged? He states that a “precaution must be taken to disconnect the unquestioned continuities by which we organize, in advance, the discourse that we are to analyze (25).” He continues further:
“What we must do, in fact, is to tear away from their virtual
self-evidence, and to free the problems that they pose; to
recognize that they are not the tranquil locus on the basis
of which other questions (concerning their structure, coherence,
systematicity, transformations) may be posed, but that they
themselves pose a whole cluster of questions (26, emphasis added).”
self-evidence, and to free the problems that they pose; to
recognize that they are not the tranquil locus on the basis
of which other questions (concerning their structure, coherence,
systematicity, transformations) may be posed, but that they
themselves pose a whole cluster of questions (26, emphasis added).”
And once again, particularly drawing attention to the potential accessing and making visible those practices which otherwise remain invisible (especially in terms of cross-cultural readings):
“by freeing them (facts of discourse) of all the groupings
that purport to be natural, immediate, universal unities, one
is able to describe other unities, but this time by means of a
group of controlled decisions… Providing one defines the conditions
clearly, it might be legitimate to constitute, on the basis of correctly
described relations, discursive groups that are not arbitrary,
and yet remain invisible (26).”
that purport to be natural, immediate, universal unities, one
is able to describe other unities, but this time by means of a
group of controlled decisions… Providing one defines the conditions
clearly, it might be legitimate to constitute, on the basis of correctly
described relations, discursive groups that are not arbitrary,
and yet remain invisible (26).”
Foucault, Michel. The Archeology of Knowledge and The Discourse on Language. New York: Harper and Row, 1972.
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Shock and Silencing, "curing" on a societal level
I stumbled upon this video today and, although it goes in quite a different direction, I think that some of the ideas Foucault presents in his book Madness and Civilization (and well as later in Discipline and Punish) can be seen in this display of the use of shock and crisis to alter a society's state of being and therefore their compliance with certain expected actions/beliefs.
Other connections that might be made between Foucault's ideas and the video include the connection between the prisoner criminal and the confined madman, particularly in the association between the madman and criminality. The use of shocking an individual into a certain childlike state implies a re-installation of a kind of power structure based on that of the patriarchal family with doctors and scientists (and other positions of authority which have in some way been validated by science [such as the economist in the video] at the father position "looking out only for the good of the subject." The video discusses very literal uses of shock on prisoners intentionally applied through various methods to bring those individuals to a certain state of compliance and docility. However it also plays upon the manner in which the individual and societal experience of shock resulting from certain national and/or global catastrophes (both natural and man-made) are essentially used or taken advantage of for political purposes and for keeping the citizen body in a state of perpetual compliance and docility, trustworthy (to an extent) of those visible and invisible authoritative bodies which are there claiming to carry out operations for the best interest of those citizens. I say perpetual compliance because it can be argued that certain tools under the command of authoritative bodies or those in positions of power, such as the media, military; etc, are used in such a way as to keep the citizen in a continual state of shock (an idea mentioned in the video as well).
The role of silencing and acts ensuring isolation as a means of maintaining this state of shock and therefore a state of docile complicity might be applied to the experience of United States citizens following the events that took place on September 11, 2001 in New York. It goes unsaid that the nation as a citizen body experienced those events with shock and the symptoms that accompany it. It has often been the subject of great debate and discussion as to the manner in which the nation's former government under the direction of former present Bush handled the situation and the nation's state of shock by calling out to each individual citizen to do their patriotic duty and go out and shop. During this past presidential election, then future-President Barack Obama criticized the Bush administration for taking advantage of the grieving nation and, most notably, for missing what Obama believed to have been a momentous opportunity to unite the public through acts of service to their fellow citizens and local communities. In thinking about this issue after having read the last chapter in Madness and Civilization titled "The Birth of the Asylum" as well as having watched this video on shock, I can't help but view the actions of the Bush administration following the nation's shock-inducing tragedy as one which prolonged a sense of shock by encouraging silence and isolation. How? Firstly, through the manner in which we were each called to "go out and shop," a practice which is personal and performed on an individual, often anonymous basis (regardless of its moving in and out of shared spaces...no serious dialogue takes place in the grocery store.) Secondly, the manner in which we received new information was provided through the unforgettable terror alert system of color coded signs to keep each individual on their toes regarding a state of fear or expectation of something potentially happening, with the color bar changing to a suggestively scarier level at what seemed like random intervals. The very reception of information in this way through the television is, like in that of shopping, an experience defined by its isolating nature in which changing information regarding potential danger is communicated to each individual personally.
Similarly, the national focus on this concept of national unity through patriotism might be understood as a kind of religion. In discussing the changing experience of madness, Foucault highlights the role of religion as being "the concrete form of what cannot go mad (244)." Likewise, religion is something experienced on a personal level and yet provides the religious individual with the illusion that she is part of a greater body/family/community. Fear is the instrument of religion to keep its followers along the "right path." Alongside fear remains the sense of an ever-present judicial body, one which threatens to judge you for a misstep, one which promises to punish should you, for instance, decide to verbalize an opinion viewed as anti-American in that it questions the practices of those in authoritative positions, it questions the doctor, the scientist, the father.
Foucault, Michel. "The Great Fear," "The New Division," "The Birth of the Asylum." Madness and Civilization : A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason. New York: Vintage, 1988.
Other connections that might be made between Foucault's ideas and the video include the connection between the prisoner criminal and the confined madman, particularly in the association between the madman and criminality. The use of shocking an individual into a certain childlike state implies a re-installation of a kind of power structure based on that of the patriarchal family with doctors and scientists (and other positions of authority which have in some way been validated by science [such as the economist in the video] at the father position "looking out only for the good of the subject." The video discusses very literal uses of shock on prisoners intentionally applied through various methods to bring those individuals to a certain state of compliance and docility. However it also plays upon the manner in which the individual and societal experience of shock resulting from certain national and/or global catastrophes (both natural and man-made) are essentially used or taken advantage of for political purposes and for keeping the citizen body in a state of perpetual compliance and docility, trustworthy (to an extent) of those visible and invisible authoritative bodies which are there claiming to carry out operations for the best interest of those citizens. I say perpetual compliance because it can be argued that certain tools under the command of authoritative bodies or those in positions of power, such as the media, military; etc, are used in such a way as to keep the citizen in a continual state of shock (an idea mentioned in the video as well).
The role of silencing and acts ensuring isolation as a means of maintaining this state of shock and therefore a state of docile complicity might be applied to the experience of United States citizens following the events that took place on September 11, 2001 in New York. It goes unsaid that the nation as a citizen body experienced those events with shock and the symptoms that accompany it. It has often been the subject of great debate and discussion as to the manner in which the nation's former government under the direction of former present Bush handled the situation and the nation's state of shock by calling out to each individual citizen to do their patriotic duty and go out and shop. During this past presidential election, then future-President Barack Obama criticized the Bush administration for taking advantage of the grieving nation and, most notably, for missing what Obama believed to have been a momentous opportunity to unite the public through acts of service to their fellow citizens and local communities. In thinking about this issue after having read the last chapter in Madness and Civilization titled "The Birth of the Asylum" as well as having watched this video on shock, I can't help but view the actions of the Bush administration following the nation's shock-inducing tragedy as one which prolonged a sense of shock by encouraging silence and isolation. How? Firstly, through the manner in which we were each called to "go out and shop," a practice which is personal and performed on an individual, often anonymous basis (regardless of its moving in and out of shared spaces...no serious dialogue takes place in the grocery store.) Secondly, the manner in which we received new information was provided through the unforgettable terror alert system of color coded signs to keep each individual on their toes regarding a state of fear or expectation of something potentially happening, with the color bar changing to a suggestively scarier level at what seemed like random intervals. The very reception of information in this way through the television is, like in that of shopping, an experience defined by its isolating nature in which changing information regarding potential danger is communicated to each individual personally.
Similarly, the national focus on this concept of national unity through patriotism might be understood as a kind of religion. In discussing the changing experience of madness, Foucault highlights the role of religion as being "the concrete form of what cannot go mad (244)." Likewise, religion is something experienced on a personal level and yet provides the religious individual with the illusion that she is part of a greater body/family/community. Fear is the instrument of religion to keep its followers along the "right path." Alongside fear remains the sense of an ever-present judicial body, one which threatens to judge you for a misstep, one which promises to punish should you, for instance, decide to verbalize an opinion viewed as anti-American in that it questions the practices of those in authoritative positions, it questions the doctor, the scientist, the father.
Foucault, Michel. "The Great Fear," "The New Division," "The Birth of the Asylum." Madness and Civilization : A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason. New York: Vintage, 1988.
Thursday, January 29, 2009
The Emergence of Morality
In addition to the first applications of Foucault’s concept of discourse, another theme that emerges in the text that I would like to comment on is that of morality in the understanding of madness and the madman as well as the proposed “treatment” of it. This topic seems to emerge most distinctly in the chapter entitled “Doctors and Patients” in which Foucault moves from the previous chapter which more so delineates various forms of madness and their respective symptoms and into the methods in which these forms and symptoms were “treated.” In the chapter, Foucault notes the fact that madness had not always been viewed as an illness which could be treated by various means. Still, even when the concept of a “cure” first came into being, it should not be understood as being medical in nature. Rather than the kind of treatment that might be received for an illness of sorts in a hospital which would essentially “correct” a problem, madness in the Classical period was understood in terms of morality and an interconnection between the body and the soul which might be said to have developed out of theories of the passions. As such, this “cure” of the madman must be something that treats not only body but the entire individual, with the soul certainly included.
It was the development of certain ideas concerning the involvement or influence of one’s lifestyle upon one’s state of madness or lack there-of which allowed medicine to bring in certain moral positions into the nature or concept of the “cure” for madness. While preceding the Classical period, madness might have been perceived as something apart from those “normal” individuals understood to still possess their sanity, now it was seen as something of a symptom of a certain kind of lifestyle and as such, was able to be made subject to the disapproval of medicine. Perhaps most interesting is the point Foucault makes concerning the development of Psychology as its own branch of medicine as being unable to exist as we know it without the central element of morality in its initial foundation.
Foucault, Michel. "Passion and Delirium," "Aspects of Madness," "Doctors and Patients." Madness and Civilization : A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason. New York: Vintage, 1988.
It was the development of certain ideas concerning the involvement or influence of one’s lifestyle upon one’s state of madness or lack there-of which allowed medicine to bring in certain moral positions into the nature or concept of the “cure” for madness. While preceding the Classical period, madness might have been perceived as something apart from those “normal” individuals understood to still possess their sanity, now it was seen as something of a symptom of a certain kind of lifestyle and as such, was able to be made subject to the disapproval of medicine. Perhaps most interesting is the point Foucault makes concerning the development of Psychology as its own branch of medicine as being unable to exist as we know it without the central element of morality in its initial foundation.
Foucault, Michel. "Passion and Delirium," "Aspects of Madness," "Doctors and Patients." Madness and Civilization : A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason. New York: Vintage, 1988.
The Discourse of Madness
My next Foucault reading covered chapters 4-6 titled “Passion and Delirium,” “Aspects of Madness,” and “Doctors and Patients.” Within this segment of his larger Madness and Civilization, Foucault really begins to present what becomes a central concept within much of his later work, that of “Discourse.” While the term itself may be loosely thrown around in various ways elsewhere, according to Foucault, “discourse” is essentially the conditions present within any given system, structure and/or practice or set of practices which are conducive to the possibility of certain truths to exist and be taken for granted. In other words, “discourse” might be better understood as a way of knowing, a system of knowledge, which enables (or makes possible the experience of) certain things to be understood as “true” and others as “false.”
Throughout the entire work, Foucault explores the various discursive practices concerning issues of madness and of “treatment” that later inform the conception of Psychology and Psychiatry that emerges following the Classical period. In “Passion and Delirium,” for example, he looks at various specific forms of madness as documented in the period, paying particular attention to the differing discourse structures experienced by the afflicted ones called “mad” which cause them to perceive certain unreal things as true. This is of particular interest when considering the emergence of this concept of madness in the “age of reason” which calls the madman he who is without reason when firstly his very labeling as such relies upon reason through which to establish an opposition, and secondly, as Foucault highlights in his concept of the discourse of madness, his experience of understanding certain untrue things as true is dependent upon a discourse structure which operates through an application of reason.
Foucault, Michel. "Passion and Delirium," "Aspects of Madness," "Doctors and Patients." Madness and Civilization : A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason. New York: Vintage, 1988.
Throughout the entire work, Foucault explores the various discursive practices concerning issues of madness and of “treatment” that later inform the conception of Psychology and Psychiatry that emerges following the Classical period. In “Passion and Delirium,” for example, he looks at various specific forms of madness as documented in the period, paying particular attention to the differing discourse structures experienced by the afflicted ones called “mad” which cause them to perceive certain unreal things as true. This is of particular interest when considering the emergence of this concept of madness in the “age of reason” which calls the madman he who is without reason when firstly his very labeling as such relies upon reason through which to establish an opposition, and secondly, as Foucault highlights in his concept of the discourse of madness, his experience of understanding certain untrue things as true is dependent upon a discourse structure which operates through an application of reason.
Foucault, Michel. "Passion and Delirium," "Aspects of Madness," "Doctors and Patients." Madness and Civilization : A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason. New York: Vintage, 1988.
Thursday, January 22, 2009
Display of the Insane - Spectacle at a Distance
The majority of space in the first three chapter’s of the English translation (a much more condensed version) of Foucualt’s Madness and Civilization is taken up in focusing on the history of the figure of the madman and the concept of the “insane” as it was initially treated or referred to in past history. This was of course to be expected since the subtitle for the work reads “a History of Insanity in the Age of Reason.” Foucault begins his larger discussion of madness by first introducing the peculiar experience of Leprosy in Europe generally around the Middle Ages (though he does tend to refer to certain happenings throughout the text which may reach farther into the depths of history.)
Highlighting the disappearance of the disease as resulting from the segregation of those bodies possessing it from the larger populace as well as marking the institutions (particularly of buildings and their organization and function), Foucault might be understood as providing a kind of lens with which to understand his approach to the remaining bulk of the text and to the subject as a whole. Firstly, he makes clear that his subject is, like the lepers defined by the visual experience in reading the body as different and in need of treatment/regulation/separation, is a matter of the manner in which bodies are read, separated and “treated” by a larger institutional order serving the public. Secondly, his focus on the remaining structures left behind following the near disappearance of Leprosy on the continent suggests what is commonly understood as his approach to understanding categories such as “madness” or “reason,” the “madman” or the “man of reason” that emerge by looking at the institutions put in place to define and regulate those categories.
While there is certainly a lot of information that can be taken out of these first three chapters as Foucault moves through different periods of time, charting the changing relationship of the “madman” to the society and the state, I would like to highlight a particular moment that I found to be of interest: the act of displaying the insane. Foucault discusses this shifting social experience of the professed “madman” primarily in the third chapter entitled “the insane” where he contrasts an emerging experience of madness during the classical period as one in which “Madness became pure spectacle (69).” Where as in previous moments in time, both the lepers and the “insane” were likely to intermingle (to a certain degree- at least, that is, that they could be encountered on the street; etc) with common folk, even viewed as a testament to what was viewed at the time as God’s grace or presence, a “guardian of truth” “remind[ing] each man of his [own] truth (14)” of “the secret nature of man (21),” during the classical period, the “age of reason, ”madness was shown, but on the other side of bars; if present, it was at a distance, under the eyes of a reason that no longer felt any relation to it and that would not compromise itself by too close a resemblance (70).” This perhaps can be understood by the ways in which the bodies/minds (noting that here, according to the time period, these two are inextricable) classified as “mad” were segregated and “treated” in the same manner in which lepers had been in previous history (fittingly, the second chapter is titled “the great confinement”. Through this segregation and through activities that were conducted exclusively to classify certain bodies in such a way which explicitly denoted them as entirely separate entities from the rest of the population, including chaining and jailing as well as display made accessible to the public for a small fee, for the individual free of such classification, “Madness had become a thing to look at: no longer a monster inside oneself (70).”
Foucault, Michel. "'Stultifera Navis'," "The Great Confinement," "The Insane." Madness and Civilization : A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason. New York: Vintage, 1988.
Highlighting the disappearance of the disease as resulting from the segregation of those bodies possessing it from the larger populace as well as marking the institutions (particularly of buildings and their organization and function), Foucault might be understood as providing a kind of lens with which to understand his approach to the remaining bulk of the text and to the subject as a whole. Firstly, he makes clear that his subject is, like the lepers defined by the visual experience in reading the body as different and in need of treatment/regulation/separation, is a matter of the manner in which bodies are read, separated and “treated” by a larger institutional order serving the public. Secondly, his focus on the remaining structures left behind following the near disappearance of Leprosy on the continent suggests what is commonly understood as his approach to understanding categories such as “madness” or “reason,” the “madman” or the “man of reason” that emerge by looking at the institutions put in place to define and regulate those categories.
While there is certainly a lot of information that can be taken out of these first three chapters as Foucault moves through different periods of time, charting the changing relationship of the “madman” to the society and the state, I would like to highlight a particular moment that I found to be of interest: the act of displaying the insane. Foucault discusses this shifting social experience of the professed “madman” primarily in the third chapter entitled “the insane” where he contrasts an emerging experience of madness during the classical period as one in which “Madness became pure spectacle (69).” Where as in previous moments in time, both the lepers and the “insane” were likely to intermingle (to a certain degree- at least, that is, that they could be encountered on the street; etc) with common folk, even viewed as a testament to what was viewed at the time as God’s grace or presence, a “guardian of truth” “remind[ing] each man of his [own] truth (14)” of “the secret nature of man (21),” during the classical period, the “age of reason, ”madness was shown, but on the other side of bars; if present, it was at a distance, under the eyes of a reason that no longer felt any relation to it and that would not compromise itself by too close a resemblance (70).” This perhaps can be understood by the ways in which the bodies/minds (noting that here, according to the time period, these two are inextricable) classified as “mad” were segregated and “treated” in the same manner in which lepers had been in previous history (fittingly, the second chapter is titled “the great confinement”. Through this segregation and through activities that were conducted exclusively to classify certain bodies in such a way which explicitly denoted them as entirely separate entities from the rest of the population, including chaining and jailing as well as display made accessible to the public for a small fee, for the individual free of such classification, “Madness had become a thing to look at: no longer a monster inside oneself (70).”
Foucault, Michel. "'Stultifera Navis'," "The Great Confinement," "The Insane." Madness and Civilization : A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason. New York: Vintage, 1988.
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