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Wathakam: The Thai Appropriation of Foucault's “Discourse”

Thanes Wongyannava

in The Ambiguous Allure of the West: Traces of the Colonial in Thailand

This chapter traces the localization of Michael Foucault's thought, in particular, his notion of “discourse,” translated as wathakam in Thai. Foucault's notion of discourse has been extensively ... More

This chapter traces the localization of Michael Foucault's thought, in particular, his notion of “discourse,” translated as wathakam in Thai. Foucault's notion of discourse has been extensively appropriated by Thai scholars, both in the humanities and social sciences, and today Thai social scientists tend to associate the word “discourse” with Foucault. One of the first appearances of wathakam was in a satirical article, “On the Discourse of Camelology.” While clearly intended to be humorous, this article makes the serious and non-trivial point that the impact of poststructuralist and postmodern theoretical trends in Thailand may not be at the level of theory. It points to the fact that the will to truth is not a Thai preoccupation, and that the obsession with the Western search for truth is perhaps too alien an enterprise to arouse enthusiasm amongst Thais. From the Thai perspective, so long as an idea or a theory is useful or practical it will be accepted and warmly welcomed.Less

Democracy and Its Other: Biopolitical Sovereignty

Dimitris Vardoulakis

in Sovereignty and Its Other: Toward the Dejustification of Violence

Chapter 5 Shows that the characteristic of biopolitical sovereignty is that it appears as pure regulation in the sense that the means of the exercise of power appear to justify the means of the ... More

Chapter 5 Shows that the characteristic of biopolitical sovereignty is that it appears as pure regulation in the sense that the means of the exercise of power appear to justify the means of the exercise of violence. It is argued, however, that the idea of an end is implicit because biopolitics relies on the operation of ancient and modern justifications of sovereign violence. The problem of resistance to power is further discussed with reference to Michel Foucault's position that any confrontation with power is doomed to increase its strength. A different strategy of resistance and of agonistic democracy is proposed through a reading of Coetzee's Life And Times of Michael K.Less

Introduction: How to Prepare a Noble Savage: The Spectacle of Human Science

Christopher Fox

in Inventing Human Science: Eighteenth-Century Domains

Central to the intellectual revolution of the Enlightenment was the ambition of creating the science of man. That the human and social sciences were born during the eighteenth century is a largely ... More

Central to the intellectual revolution of the Enlightenment was the ambition of creating the science of man. That the human and social sciences were born during the eighteenth century is a largely accepted view. In his project, David Hume shared with contemporaries a new-felt need to account for moral as natural things. Science itself has been the subject of vast scrutiny, both as a system of inquiry and in respect to its global impact. In the ensuing turmoil, people have heard much about the mystifications of scientific rationality, notably through the writings of Michael Foucault. The last several decades have also seen an explosion in eighteenth-century studies and new techniques of inquiry which have insisted that we should not take the scientific rhetoric at face value.Less

On the Theory and Practice of Power

Sheldon S. Wolin

Nicholas Xenos (ed.)

in Fugitive Democracy: And Other Essays

This chapter analyzes Michel Foucault's conception of power. It suggests that the Foucaldian conception remains incomplete, which provides the opportunity to criticize current postmodern conceptions ... More

This chapter analyzes Michel Foucault's conception of power. It suggests that the Foucaldian conception remains incomplete, which provides the opportunity to criticize current postmodern conceptions before they settle in as reigning orthodoxies. Foucault approached the notion of power through a running criticism of some of the distinctive categories of modern political theory. The most important of these were theory, action, and the sovereign state. Theory and action is a formula as old as Western political theory, but it became the hallmark of modern political thinking, both in Hobbes's conjunction of theory and technology and in Marx's linking of theory to revolution. Foucault viewed theory as a totalizing system of thought, an all-inclusiveness that was at once authoritarian and ignorant.Less

Players as Moral Beings

Miguel Sicart

in The Ethics of Computer Games

This chapter explores the process of becoming a player. It begins by taking up the concept of game as object, framing it within Michel Foucault’s theories about power. These structures create a ... More

This chapter explores the process of becoming a player. It begins by taking up the concept of game as object, framing it within Michel Foucault’s theories about power. These structures create a being, a subjectivity that can be explained using the theory of Alain Badiou, which has a certain tradition in the field of computer game research. Barbara Becker’s theories on the body-subject lead a methodological turn toward a phenomenological and hermeneutical understanding of the player. This turn sets the player as subject into perspective, providing an approach for understanding the player as a moral being. It is argued that because the player is a subject that exists in a game situation, and because this subject operates by interpreting this situation both within the ethics and culture of her experience as player and as a human being, the player as subject can legitimately be considered a moral being. A computer game is then a moral object that is actualized by a moral agent.Less

Collaborative Fieldwork

Paul Rabinow and Anthony Stavrianakis

in Demands of the Day: On the Logic of Anthropological Inquiry

This chapter discusses the preparatory stage of collaborative fieldwork. It also presents some reflections on the forms of power relations identified by Michael Foucault, preparedness, equipment and ... More

This chapter discusses the preparatory stage of collaborative fieldwork. It also presents some reflections on the forms of power relations identified by Michael Foucault, preparedness, equipment and venue-mode subjectivation.Less

Politics of Utopia: Fantasy, Pornography, and Boys Love

Rio Otomo

in Boys Love Manga and Beyond: History, Culture, and Community in Japan

This chapter continues the discussion of Boys Love (BL) studies by interrogating BL narratives as feminist-utopian pornographic fantasies, with an analysis of the works of Judith Butler, Luce ... More

This chapter continues the discussion of Boys Love (BL) studies by interrogating BL narratives as feminist-utopian pornographic fantasies, with an analysis of the works of Judith Butler, Luce Irigaray, and Michael Foucault. It looks at feminist theories of how fantasy works in women's pornography in order to challenge the common perception that pornographic imagery is necessarily degrading or demeaning. The study relates to the false perception that participating writers and readers of BL are fujoshi, the “rotten girls,” who are sexually deprived in real life. To highlight this reading, it also contrasts the essentially narcissistic autoeroticism of Modernist writer Mishima Yukio's obsession with three-dimensional male bodies with female BL artists/readers' fascination with the flat, two-dimensional bodies of fantasized male BL characters. The absence of female characters in the BL text entails the negation of their own female bodies, and thus enables an erotic autonomy that is not tied to any specific viewpoint or sexual identity.Less