Foucault in 90 Minutes Quotes

“Foucault recognised that the most important aspect of power lay in social relations. Individuals might have power in the form of domination and constraint; but more important, power was also involved in the production and use of knowledge.”
― Paul Strathern, Foucault: Philosophy in an Hour

“Knowledge was always purposive: it was characterised by a will to dominate or appropriate.”
― Paul Strathern, Foucault: Philosophy in an Hour

“As our knowledge of DNA expands, and our expertise in genetic manipulation increases, the concept of humanity may well become redundant.”
― Paul Strathern, Foucault: Philosophy in an Hour

“The Renaissance episteme gave way to the Classical episteme (for us, the episteme of the Age of Reason). Instead of resemblance, thought now turned to distinction. Analysis gave rise to measurement and experiment.”
― Paul Strathern, Foucault: Philosophy in an Hour

“A particular episteme is bound to give rise to a particular form of knowledge. Foucault called the latter a discourse, by which he meant the accumulation of concepts, practices, statements, and beliefs that were produced by a particular episteme.”
― Paul Strathern, Foucault: Philosophy in an Hour

“The set of assumptions, prejudices, and mind-sets that structured and limited the thought of any particular age was referred to by Foucault as an episteme. This word derives from the same ancient Greek root as the branch of philosophy known as epistemology”
― Paul Strathern, Foucault: Philosophy in an Hour

“The emergence of any knowledge system is always linked with a shift in power.”
― Paul Strathern, Foucault: Philosophy in an Hour

“According to Laing, the apparently incomprehensible and self-contradictory language of the schizophrenic is often a gnomic expression of the twisted truth that the patient is unable to express.”
― Paul Strathern, Foucault: Philosophy in an Hour

“The holiness of madness was transformed into the more humanist concept of ‘wisdom’.”
― Paul Strathern, Foucault: Philosophy in an Hour

“As he later remarked, sometimes freedom can become as repressive as direct repression.”
― Paul Strathern, Foucault: Philosophy in an Hour

“The potent mix of Nietzschean philosophy, psychology, history, and clinical practice was leading him into new territory”
― Paul Strathern, Foucault: Philosophy in an Hour

“The truth about oneself was not ‘something given, something which we have to discover – it is something we must create ourselves’. Even”
― Paul Strathern, Foucault: Philosophy in an Hour

“German philosopher Hegel, whose philosophy insisted on the coherence and meaning of history. The”
― Paul Strathern, Foucault: Philosophy in an Hour