the function of statement
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Foucaults statement
The following is an excerpt from my groups Wave about the Foucault reading for this week.
It primarily deals with Foucaults discussion of the statement.
This time well be discussing the statement so something in order to read that concept
would work. It is interesting that Foucault doesnt give examples of his work. He leaves it
pretty conceptual. That is, until later when he reads closely things like madness, prisons, and
sexuality in light of the foundations hes established.
Maybe this will help, though: it is not in itself a unit, but a function (87). AND its a
function that reveals [structures and possible unities] (87).
I cant help but think of a statement in a normal way that I would about somethign
making a statement, or something saying something. Like Avatar making a statement
about war. I feel like thats a rather over-simplified understanding of it but because
Foucault does his best to NOT give us a clear understanding, I feel like thats what I am left
with.
The University of Phoenix instructs of faculty to use Emoticons. Perhaps this pertains to the
statement in an interesting way. Emoticon as statement.
So we have symbols that make up statements that then create discursive formations.
Wikipedia is a discursive formation.
And as I take it, we cant have statements without symbols. Because statements have to have
a level of materiality to existwhether its oral, written, etc.
Although, as far as I can tell, Foucault doesnt give examples of visually rhetorical
statements they are primarily linguistic for him.
Statements exist in a complex web with other statements and absolutely cannot stand by
themselves in order to be a statement; their existence depends on the existence of the other
statements with which they relate. Although this connection to other statements is
distinguished from context.
Also, a statement cannot be defined by a proposition or an author, but can contain both. I am
not sure at this point if it can contain just one or the other, but I think so. Sometimes the
creator of a statement is an actor or even a reader So an author, in its broadest sense, is
very likely always there in some sense.
This is all just background to get my head about it. I think statements in Wikipedia definitely
qualify because a. Its a level of materiality 2. There are other statements to create a web of
meaning 3. There are authors and propositions but they dont alone define the statements 4.
There are rules with which the statements in Wikipedia must operate, or actually Wikipediawill throw them out or write a note that the sources arent adequatewhat else
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One thing I was confused about is in the Enunciative Function chapter, Foucault discusses
how statements cant exist alonelike I mentioned previouslybut how did statements ever
even begin? I mean in terms of Wikipedia, that concept isnt hard to digest. Also, in relation
to Wikipediamultiple authors/ enunciators / what have you can repeat the same statement,
just a different occurrence of enunciation. Its like, someone goes into Wikipedia, gets some
information/ meaning /group of statements, and passes that information on to a friend or a
reportsame statement, different enunciation.
Also, since Foucault says a statement is deeper, structurallythough not always meaningfully
than some sort of psychological function (such as a speaker acting on a rhetorical situation, I
guess, or a certain motive), it would make sense that Wikipedia is a collection of statements.
At the root of Wikipedia is something much deeper than a rhetorical situationsome sort of
more unmoving meaning to things. Fact, I guess, for lack of a better term. Would statements
be that term I am looking for?
Wikipedia is a classic example of social construction, so yes it is a much deeper rhetorical
situation. Maybe that is where the enunciation comes into the discussion.
Also, I like on page 104 where he uses the term agreed code when discussing statements. I
feel like Wikipedia, in all its socially-constructed glory, centers around this agreed code or
what is truth. I think that agreed code is what Foucault means are statementsmeanings that
follow establish rules, codes, ideologies, etc. of other units of discourse, and form a complex
web of meaningbut meaning nonetheless. Or perhaps that statements exist in relation to this
agreed code, both abiding by it and creating it. For a discourse to exist, those involved must
be talking about the same thing, by placing themselves at the same level or at the same
distance, by deploying the same conceptual field (126).
[Though, for all the social-constructioniness of Foucault, I can understand how one would
read him as a structuralist, with Foucault saying things like: "there are not, in such cases, the
same number of statements as there are languages used, but a single group of statements in
different linguistic forms" (104). I don't think Foucault was really trying to be structuralistic
there, as there is context to that sentence, but I can see one viewing that extracted statement as
a logical unfolding of Foucaultian thought.]
Another quote I like: a statement is too bound up with what surrounds it and supports it to be
as free as a pure form (it is more than a law of construction governing a group of elements), it
is endowed with a certain modifiable heaviness, a weight relative to the field in which it is
placed, a constancy that allows various users, a temporal permanence that does not have the
intertia of a mere trace or mark, and which does not sleep on its own past (105).
I feel like this quote has social construction of truth written all over it. (No pun intended).
First of all, a statement cannot ever be merely relative even though it can change itself to
become a new, more meaningful statement. Or newly meaningful statementanywaya
statement has temporal permanence. Semi-permanence in that it belongs to a field, is caught
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up with other statements that are the basis for its definition, etc.but its only temporal
permanence. Such as his example for what the theory of the Earth being round meant before
they actually discovered ithow that statement changed because the field changed. In terms
of Wikipedia, just think of all the statements that will change and become new statements
over time. Because as he also says on page 105 as well"men produce, manipluate use,
transform, exchange, combine, decompose and recompose, and possibly destory. Its not
something said once and for all. And if there was any Truth with a capital T behind a
statement, it would be once and for all, and have that finality. Which is so great about
Wikipediatheres no finality at all. We can go in there and change any entry we want right
now. I feel like it embodies a collection of statements in Foucaults terms even better than an
old school encyclopedia.
The discussion of Wikipedia is an interesting example because it exists at this intersection of
some important Foucaultian concepts. On one hand, Wikipedia is an opening up of discourse
affording individual voice that counters hegemonic institutional knowledge. Wikipedia isnot the same as Encyclopedia Britanica. Yet, it is bound by institutional practices even
discipline. Foucault could almost have been defining Wikipedia on page 130, saying, the
archive defines a particular level: that of a practice that causes a multiplicity of statements to
emerge [...]; between tradition and oblivion, it reveals the rules of a practice that enables
statements both to survive and to undergo regular modification. It is the general system of the
formation and transformation of statements.
And let us not forget that the word archive is etymylogically connected to the word, archon,
which means ruler. Thus, our archives have attained a kind of rule over our ways of thinking.
See my project concerning this issue at http://theyellowrobot.com/foucault.html.
Lastly, we may consider how the statement, while interstingly explored through the constructs
of Wikipedia, may exist without meaning, context, or referent at all. Foucault writes, Nor is
it [the statement] superposable to the relation that may exist between a sentence and its
meaning (90). Foucaults example of AZERT shows that there can be a statement that exists
aside from traditionally held conceptualizations of reality or intended thought. So, while
Wikipedia includes many, many carefully and socially constructed statements, there may be
statements out there that lack many of the aspects that are necessary for the language to be
used in a distinctly encyclopedic manner.
The question is just how bare bones can a statement be? I tried to look for a statement this
morning at 5:30 a.m. in the water droplets on my shower curtain, but couldnt find one there.
But maybe someone else could haveMaybe this will help, though: it is not in itself a unit,
but a function (87). AND its a function that reveals [structures and possible unities] (87). I
cant help but think of a statement in a normal way that I would about somethign
making a statement, or something saying something. Like Avatar making a statement
about war. I feel like thats a rather over-simplified understanding of it but because
Foucault does his best to NOT give us a clear understanding, I feel like thats what I am left
with.The University of Phoenix instructs of faculty to use Emoticons. Perhaps this pertains tothe statement in an interesting way. Emoticon as statement.:)So we have symbols that make
-
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up statements that then create discursive formations. Wikipedia is a discursive formation.And
as I take it, we cant have statements without symbols. Because statements have to have a
level of materiality to existwhether its oral, written, etc. Although, as far as I can tell,
Foucault doesnt give examples of visually rhetorical statements they are primarily
linguistic for him.Statements exist in a complex web with other statements and absolutely
cannot stand by themselves in order to be a statement; their existence depends on the
existence of the other statements with which they relate. Although this connection to other
statements is distinguished from context.Also, a statement cannot be defined by a
proposition or an author, but can contain both. I am not sure at this point if it can contain just
one or the other, but I think so. Sometimes the creator of a statement is an actor or even a
reader So an author, in its broadest sense, is very likely always there in some sense.This
is all just background to get my head about it. I think statements in Wikipedia definitely
qualify because a. Its a level of materiality 2. There are other sta tements to create a web of
meaning 3. There are authors and propositions but they dont alone define the statements 4.
There are rules with which the statements in Wikipedia must operate, or actually Wikipedia
will throw them out or write a note that the sources arent adequatewhat elseOne thing I
was confused about is in the Enunciative Function chapter, Foucault discusses how statements
cant exist alonelike I mentioned previouslybut how did statements ever even begin? I
mean in terms of Wikipedia, that concept isnt hard to digest. Also, in relation to Wikipedia
multiple authors/ enunciators / what have you can repeat the same statement, just a different
occurrence of enunciation. Its like, someone goes into Wikipedia, gets some information/
meaning /group of statements, and passes that information on to a friend or a reportsame
statement, different enunciation.Also, since Foucault says a statement is deeper, structurally
though not always meaningfullythan some sort of psychological function (such as a speakeracting on a rhetorical situation, I guess, or a certain motive), it would make sense that
Wikipedia is a collection of statements. At the root of Wikipedia is something much deeper
than a rhetorical situationsome sort of more unmoving meaning to things. Fact, I guess, for
lack of a better term. Would statements be that term I am looking for? Wikipedia is a classic
example of social construction, so yes it is a much deeper rhetorical situation. Maybe that is
where the enunciation comes into the discussion. Also, I like on page 104 where he uses the
term agreed code when discussing statements. I feel like Wikipedia, in all its socially-
constructed glory, centers around this agreed code or what is truth. I think that agreed
code is what Foucault means are statementsmeanings that follow establish rules, codes,
ideologies, etc. of other units of discourse, and form a complex web of meaningbut meaning
nonetheless. Or perhaps that statements exist in relation to this agreed code, both abiding by it
and creating it. For a discourse to exist, those involved must be talking about the same
thing, by placing themselves at the same level or at the same distance, by deploying the
same conceptual field (126).[Though, for all the social-constructioniness of Foucault, I can
understand how one would read him as a structuralist, with Foucault saying things like: "there
are not, in such cases, the same number of statements as there are languages used, but a single
group of statements in different linguistic forms" (104). I don't think Foucault was really
trying to be structuralistic there, as there is context to that sentence, but I can see one viewing
that extracted statement as a logical unfolding of Foucaultian thought.]Another quote I like: astatement is too bound up with what surrounds it and supports it to be as free as a pure form
-
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(it is more than a law of construction governing a group of elements), it is endowed with a
certain modifiable heaviness, a weight relative to the field in which it is placed, a constancy
that allows various users, a temporal permanence that does not have the intertia of a mere
trace or mark, and which does not sleep on its own past (105).I feel like this quote has social
construction of truth written all over it. (No pun intended). First of all, a statement cannot ever
be merely relative even though it can change itself to become a new, more meaningful
statement. Or newly meaningful statementanywaya statement has temporal permanence.
Semi-permanence in that it belongs to a field, is caught up with other statements that are the
basis for its definition, etc.but its only temporal permanence. Such as his example for
what the theory of the Earth being round meant before they actually discovered ithow that
statement changed because the field changed. In terms of Wikipedia, just think of all the
statements that will change and become new statements over time. Because as he also says on
page 105 as well"men produce, manipluate use, transform, exchange, combine, decompose
and recompose, and possibly destory. Its not something said once and for all. And if there
was any Truth with a capital T behind a statement, it would be once and for all, and have that
finality. Which is so great about Wikipediatheres no finality at all. We can go in there and
change any entry we want right now. I feel like it embodies a collection of statements in
Foucaults terms even better than an old school encyclopedia.The discussion of Wikipedia is
an interesting example because it exists at this intersection of some important Foucaultian
concepts. On one hand, Wikipedia is an opening up of discourse affording individual voice
that counters hegemonic institutional knowledge. Wikipedia is not the same as Encyclopedia
Britanica. Yet, it is bound by institutional practices even discipline. Foucault could almost
have been defining Wikipedia on page 130, saying, the archive defines a particular level: that
of a practice that causes a multiplicity of statements to emerge [...]; between tradition andoblivion, it reveals the rules of a practice that enables statements both to survive and to
undergo regular modification. It is the general system of the formation and transformation of
statements. And let us not forget that the word archive is etymylogically connected to the
word, archon, which means ruler. Thus, our archives have attained a kind of rule over our
ways of thinking. See my project concerning this issue at
http://theyellowrobot.com/foucault.html.Lastly, we may consider how the statement, while
interstingly explored through the constructs of Wikipedia, may exist without meaning,
context, or referent at all. Foucault writes, Nor is it [the statement] superposable to the
relation that may exist between a sentence and its meaning (90). Foucaults example of
AZERT shows that there can be a statement that exists aside from traditionally held
conceptualizations of reality or intended thought. So, while Wikipedia includes many, many
carefully and socially constructed statements, there may be statements out there that lack
many of the aspects that are necessary for the language to be used in a distinctly encyclopedic
manner.The question is just how bare bones can a statement be? I tried to look for a statement
this morning at 5:30 a.m. in the water droplets on my shower curtain, but couldnt find one
there. But maybe someone else could have>
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statement - The statement is the basic unit of discourse, and therefore the basic unit analyzed
in the archeological method. The statement has, however, no stable unit; depending on the
conditions in which it emerges and exists within a field of discourse, and depending on scope
of the 'field of use' in which it is to be analyzed, anything from a scientific chart to a sentence
to a novel can be a statement. This makes the statement difficult to define in and of itself, and
Foucault ends up defining it not in terms of a stable unit (like the sentence), but in terms of a
specific field of function and a corresponding level of the analysis of signs. The enunciative
function defines the level at which the statement operates; at issue is how a set of signs
emerges and functions in relation to a field of other statements. The level of analysis by which
we can describe the statement lies between the analysis of grammar and propositional content
on the one hand, and the fact of pure materiality on the other; the analysis of statements works
at the level of the active life of language as it functions in a discourse. This in-between status
of the statement, in which it is neither just content nor just material, gives statements the
definitive quality of 'material repeatability' (see below
Notes on: Foucault M (1974) The Archaeology of Knowledge, London: Tavistock
PublicationsLtd
[My] Critical Introduction
This book represents a different level of analysis for Foucault, away from the usual analyses
of institutions and institutional ideologies, or networks of power, to look at the notion of
discourse as constitutive of academic disciplines. I found many ambiguities in the
discussion of the term 'discourse':
1. He seems to refer to different levels of organisation -- there are discourses, discursive
formations, positivities, epistemes and so on. From what I can see, positivities and epistemes
are discourses in principle, so to speak, which affect concrete discourses.
2. This produces an ambiguity over whether everything is 'discourse'-- Foucault seems to
affirm it in part 2 but denies it in part 4, perhaps because he is using different notions of
discourse.
3. There are some weird oscillations in the argument, including lots of denial of causality,
essentialism, philosophical anthropology and so on (especially in part II), but there is a sense
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in which these banned notions return: Foucault needs causality to explain the specifics of why
one discourse triumphs and not another; he needs subjects to do the practices which constitute
discourses. There are some strange discussions here too of his own motives, interests, desires
and so on, raising the spectre of the old combination of theoretical and political motives for all
this, together with a personal desire to innovate.
I'm not at all sure that it is all that original. I was constantly reminded of work like Kuhn's
(which is certainly far more readable).
Foucault seems to ignore or deny the specific effectivity of universities and pedagogies. They
are mentioned once or twice as being important in the development of discourses, but this is
never pursued. As a result this seems to be far too much emphasis placed on the activities of
linguists or political economists or whatever to somehow dominate public thought. Many of
his actual examples seem located in some pre-University 'classical' era?
There are some lovely implication for the emergence of things like 'the perspectives' in
sociology, though. These must now be seen as a construct, the result of a [pedagogical?]
discourse.They do imply some underlying unifying concept as well. They clearly need
deconstruction and then reconstruction -- as discourses that claim to cross gaps, or show
relations of difference and so on?
Part one
We need to contrast the usual history of the emergence of academic disciplines in terms of
some smooth development, involving underlying causals, and trends with those histories of
epistemological ruptures and discontinuities in the work of people like Bachelard and
Canguilhem [which is whereAlthusser got his idea of an epistemological break in Marx].Their history is not a simple one of increasing rationality of concepts, but one of different
uses, rules of use, and contexts. There are plural networks of pasts, histories, and teleologies,
which can be traced especially in various figures of breaks from ideologies to sciences. The
problem really is to explain the continuity of terms such as concepts or theories.
There is one underlying problem in both sorts of history -- what is a document? Is it a trace of
a past trend, of 'unities, totalities, series, relations' (page 7)? Or a prompt for some collectively
unconscious memory? History can now be seen as a way to link documents rather than relying
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on such a memory, as an 'intrinsic description of the monument', as archaeology. This means
that:
1. It is much more open to different notions of series and so on, and suggested relationshipsbetween series; it becomes a history of strata, events. In the history of thought, this leads to an
individualisation of series rather than some overall totality.
2. Discontinuity is much more important and should become central to a deliberate method
to avoid reductionism. Discontinuity should emerge as a result of a proper investigation, as a
general problem which history should illustrate. Once seen as an obstacle, it now becomes a
problem to be solved, or a definite working concept.
3. There is no total history, no general underlying themes, no eras. We should now pursue a
search for series and their possible interrelationships, which can be displayed as 'tables', with
no central principles.
4. We need new methodologies to manage documents. Should we take representative
samples, or whole corpora? What level of analysis should be pursued, should it be
quantitative or qualitative? What groupings should be studied, and what relations exist
between them -- causal ones, functional ones or linguistic ones?
This sort of challenge to orthodox history dates from Marx, but we are still waiting for an
explicit theorising of discontinuity, for example in linguistics. Instead, we have long been
afraid of discontinuity, of the Other (page 12). We have wanted to preserve history as the last
refuge for the 'sovereignty of consciousness' (page 12): it guarantees the project of the
subject, its ability to grasp the past so as to avoid alienation in the future. Marxist decentring
has been fought off, often by referring to matters such as 'values' or 'civilisation', which areassumed to be continuous. Nietzsche's notion of genealogy has also been resisted, by
insisting that rationality is a central principle [rather than some arbitrary starting point
developed according to rather petty interests, which is roughly Nietzsche's
position].Approaches such as those in structural psychoanalysis, linguistics, or ethnology
which attempt to decentre the subject have been resisted by developing a notion of history as
the 'hard work of freedom', as a matter of dynamism opposed to the stasis of structures (and
this includes the development of a humanised marxism, page 13). The last refuge of the
subject can now only be found in new 'myths, kinship systems, language, sexuality or desire'
(page 14).
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The project in this book is to do history without such anthropology, and also to systematise
Foucault's earlier work [specifically Madness... , Birth..., and The Order of Things]. This is
allegedly pursued bottom-up, rather than by importing a method, using Foucault's own
historical accounts [in these books] as a basis, although they are still too general (Madness)
or too structural (Birth). Criticism from his colleagues has made him aware of this, and so
there is still a need to be cautious. However, he is still against those critical approaches which
seemed designed 'to reduce others to silence' (page 17). Foucault admits that his style can be
vexing for a reader [especially when he indulges in strange imaginary dialogues with the
reader, as below], and he enters a short digression on the pleasures of writing:
'I am no doubt not the only one who writes in order to have no face. Do not ask who I am and
do not ask me to remain the same: leave it to our bureaucrats and our police to see that ourpapers are in order. At least spare us their morality when we write' (page 17).
Part 2
It is necessary to do some negative analysis first, to deconstruct older categories, including
'book', 'oeuvres', genres and any [philosophical] anthropological categories. We are trying to
get a set of discursive 'effective statements',which are not just linguistic units but discursive
ones. Effective statements constitute a large but finite field, which replaces the idea of
structural possibilities. The issue here is not one of trying to establish linguistic rules, but
rather asking 'How is it that one statement appeared rather than another' (page 27). This
should lead to a concrete, specific and descriptive rather than an allegorical analysis of things
like films, theories or thoughts: allegorical analysis always looks for some other meaning in
what is said, some latent discourse. There is a need to stress discontinuities,even though we
admit the possibility of a return to more conventional unities at the end -- at least we will have
denaturalised these unities, however.There are good empirical reasons for choosing the field
of the human sciences which can be seen as 'groups of discourses', but only as initialapproximations.
What of the conventional disciplines? These are seemingly based on identical objects of
inquiry, such as madness, but does this mean that there is some common space within which
objects are constituted? Such a notion would help us begin to grasp divisions, and dispersions
of objects. A similar argument might be developed about the linguistic styles of discourses --
they seem to have common vocabularies and descriptive statements, as in medicine. However,
there is something deeper to be investigated, a system which generates such statements andrules of deployment, so that we can investigate how these discourses produce different
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concrete and heterogeneous statements. We can investigate for example 'ways they interlock
or exclude' each other,how they 'transform', and the 'play of their location, arrangements and
replacement' (page 34).The aim is not to devise a scheme to integrate different concepts,but
rather to 'analyse the interplay of their appearances and dispersion' (page 35), and the same
goes for various organising themes [as in sociological perspectives?]. Again, there is constant
doubt about these themes, such as the way they are articulated in different concepts (page 36),
or the way that concepts are shared in discourses based on different themes.
Discourses are specific because they're always 'points of choice', in terms of the different
possibilities to animate themes, develop strategies, or play different games (page 37). In this
way, differences and dispositions should not be seen as a problem but as the raw materials of
analysis: they cannot be reduced or managed, and they should not be ignored in favour of
generalisations from 'small islands of coherence' (page38).
We should attempt to uncover 'discursive formations'-- systems of dispersion, regularities in
choices -- rather than operate with categories such as science or ideology. We need to
investigate their rules of formation, their conditions of existence. This is a speculative venture
and it could lead either to the rediscovery of the older genres, or a blank, indifferent space'
(page 39).
How do the objects of the various sciences emerge? [the example here is psychopathology].
This often happens against the context of other objects found in other disciplines, and
involves processes working on those objects, such as transformation, resemblance, difference,
proximity, negation and soon. Various [usually institutional] 'authorities' are able to delimit
this activity, using various existing 'grids of specification' (page42)-- which may involve
familiar categories such as the soul versus the body, individual histories, whole existing fields
of causality and so on.There are also various specific connections, such as that between the
law and psychiatry [concretised in the prison system]. If relations between these concepts
overlap then a discursive formation can emerge. These are then underpinned by
'institutions,economic and social processes, behavioural patterns, systems of norms,
techniques, types of classification, and modes of characterisation' (page 45). Certain' primary
relations' between institutions on their own may or may not make discourses possible:
usually, secondary or reflexive relations are necessary too as well as disscursive relations in
their own right.
All this takes place before any naming, classification or explanation, and it clearly operates as
a practice rather than just a linguistic activity. These practical processes provide the unity of a
discipline. How it happens is the point of analysis, rather than political criticisms of some ofthe consequences, such as labelling certain people as mad.
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We need to rescue the complexity and density of discursive objects, rather than trying to
recapture 'things', which apparently exist prior to discourse, to examine discursive rather than
linguistic rules, to write a 'history of discursive objects' (page 48). Discourses are positive
practices rather than just connections between words and things. Discursive objects have their
own rules of ordering, as 'practices that systematically form the objects of which they speak'
(page 49).
The example of clinical discourse makes this point. It consists of a complex relation of
descriptions, accounts, explanations and reasonings which are linked in various ways:
1. By the status of the doctor as a person legally entitled to use clinical languages. This is
itself a complex matter, relating to other statuses, obligations, systems of qualification and so
on which make it quite specific.
2. In institutional sites for the doctor where clinical discourse is applied -- the hospital, the
laboratory, the library, or a documented field, all of which are regulated, constraining or
enabling in different ways.
3. In various positions occupied by subjects, who have to learn, use instruments, and occupy
a place in information networks. These positions are complex and can change or shift in
status, according to their location in hospitals, laboratories, or books in the library. We see the
emergence of whole 'modalities of enunciation' of the clinical discourse (page 53).
Overall, the practice of clinical discourse fixes the relations between these elements. Suchrelations cannot be reduced to logical successions of types of diagnosis, for example, or to
some general consciousness which progresses, or to a story of how actual doctors shifted from
traditional to clinical modes.Modalities of enunciation disperse the subject (there is no unified
medical gaze as in Birth...). Discourses are not simply the expressions of some subjective
synthesis, but are better seen as spaces, or networks of sites and statuses.
General preconceptual discursive rules produce specific concepts in a discourse. These may
be localised into specific fields, such as linguistics, or economics, but they are interconnected,either at some higher levels or via a certain 'concomitance [the relations between, say,
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linguistics and cosmology are connected in that they are both general scientific ways of
thinking]. These rules generates a variety of sometimes conflicting concepts, hence the
appearance of dispersion, since they are not strictly logical [a large number of details are
offered on pages 56-60]. There are some general types of rules:
1. Forms of succession, governing how implications are pursued, how descriptions are
progressively specified, how various statements are combined for example in rhetorical
schemata, or hypothetico-deductive mechanisms.
2. Forms of co-existence which include boundaries around statements in a discourse's 'field
of presence', and which leave some outside. There are also fields of concomitance, including
analogical confirmations, general principles or models, and disciplines which act as higher
authorities, such as mathematics. Finally, there is a field of memory, which consists of
traditions to which one expresses relations of 'filiation, genesis, transformation and
continuity' (page 58).
3. Procedures of intervention, which regulates rewriting, transcribing or translating
(including translating qualitative into quantitative terms). These can assist in refining
statements, delimiting them, according to the validity of transference from one field to
another. They permit systematising propositions.
Some of these rules are explicit, some rhetorical, some internal and some relational in terms
of other texts, but together they constitute a system to generate concepts and statements and to
explain their dispersion in various actual theories, as actual discourses.
Strategies also focus discourses, and this can explain how different discourses can appear
from within the same discursive formations. Strategies consist of 'themes and theories' (page
64) [they seem to function rather as do 'research programmes' for Lakatos]. Strategies
crystallise out from a number of possibilities:
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1. As the effects of certain 'discursive constellations' which provide models, general theories
and so on [very close to Kuhn's notion of a paradigm here]. New constellations provide new
possibilities for discursive formations to become autonomous from their existing
constellations.
2. From various kinds of social authority. There are social functions exercised by a strategy,
including pedagogic practice [but only, apparently for those grammarians discussed on page
68]. Discourses are appropriated by various social groups in the familiar way, but also form
connections to 'possible positions of desire': they may become 'a place for phantasmic
representations, an element of symbolization, a form of the forbidden, an instrument of
derived satisfaction (page 68), not only for poetic discourses but also those referring to
wealth, language, nature, life, and madness.
Together, all these possibilities explain the formation of individualised discourses clustered
around strategies. There is the usual need to remember the specificity of the level of
discourses -- these are not merely ideologies, or even expressions, but have their own effects,
of transformation, and linking, or enunciation [they seem to transcend individual ideologies,
which appear here as rather vulgar variants?]. Strategies are just one interwoven element, but
an important one to remind us that discourses are never 'pure' (page 70).
It is difficult to trace all the factors that produce these unities, but the point here is to make the
case for the unity of dispersed and concrete discourses.This case relies on a two-level
analysis, operating at the level of the system first and then moving to actual discourses
[sociology and politics can be used to explain the latter as a crystallisation of the former]. The
lower levels are also effective in choosing concepts, though:the discursive level should not be
seen as dominated by determinant from outside, and a discursive formation acts merely as a
link between discrete series of discourses. This view opposes the usual forms of analysis
which are typically one sided. The pre- systematic and the pre-discursive are still important'Discourse and system produce each other -- and conjointly-- only at the cost of this immense
reserve' (page 76). The pre-discursive level is itself still discursive, however, not some more
primitive underlying 'life' or 'being' --'One remains within the dimension of discourse' (page
76). [This whole section seems to me to be in deep trouble. I'm not sure if this is
sophistication or evasion of a well-known problem. Discursive analysis looks abstract and
idealist, and Foucault tries to avoid this by introducing a major role for some materialist 'pre-
discursive' level, and for practice and specific history -- yet these factors cannot be grasped
except as discourses too!].
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Part 3
Let us return to the issue of statements rather than concepts as some kind of basic unit of
analysis. These focus our attention on enunciative characteristics' (page 81) rather than
some logical or linguistic structure.This helps us to analyse 'what occurred by the very fact
that the statement was made in specific circumstances' (page 83).[A lengthy debate ensues
examining the claims of rival linguistic units such as speech acts, propositions or sentences --
pages 82-84]. Statement should be seen as signs that make sense, as functions such as the
enunciative function:
1. Which is apparently not reducible to mere linguistic qualities, not just a matterof the
relations between signifiers and signified, or proposition and referent. [There is a great dealof dense reasoning here, and swathes of typically philosophicalargument, often ultimately
appealing to common sense. I may not have understood a word of it]. Social contexts are
crucial. Enunciation does not just depend on meanings derived from linguistic rules or logical
truths, but refer to much broader 'referentials', such as 'laws of possibility' (page 91). The
relation between an enunciative statement and its referential is not logical or empirical either,
but should be seen as an internal relation between the statement and its 'spaces of
differentiation' (page 92) [I don't know what this means].
2. It also has a special relation with its [human] subject : statements do not simply convey
the privileged meanings of their author. For example there might be some special,
anonymous, all-seeing subject uttering statements, as in the narrator of a [realist] novel. The
subject becomes a function rather than a concrete individual, although sometimes this
function is so specific that there can only be one [bearer], such as the author of a scientific
innovation. Compare this level of specificity with the anonymous empty function of the
addressee in the simple maths text (page 94).
3. The relation of the statement to its domain is a necessary one, moving beyond the
functions of isolated sentences. We should not just see this as a matter of some determining
context, since this relation makes a context possible, by operating in fictional or scientific
domains, for example (page 98).There is an 'associated field', provided by other elements,
such as those provided in a conversation or a demonstration, a number of quite implicit
references, a set of implications which follow, and a set of statements to which this one
belongs (marking it as literature or science and so on).These statements emerge from whole
metacontexts, or 'enuciative fields' (page 99) This field, and the enunciative function itself, is
therefore prior to the formation of actual sentences or propositions, and thus also prior to
structural or logical analysis.
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4. Analysis must be material, since the form that a statement takes, whether written or
spoken, for example, has a material effect and an historical location . Such statements are
constitutive, and should not be seen simply as a variation from some imaginary pure sentence.
They exhibit both specific and universal qualities, as can be seen from difficulties that arise in
use, for example when a statement is repeated. Their material existence in institutions produce
definite possibilities of reinscription and transcription, but also constraints (page 103)
[Overall then, we seem to have some strong arguments to distinguish Foucault's formulation
from his rivals and to maintain his peculiar definitions and so on. He claims that this will
enable us to examine matters such as circulation, use, disappearance, recognition, andvarious tactical appropriations' of such statements (page 105). As an example of his
appalling style,with which I have struggled manfully, try the following:
'Should we say similarly that the statement refers to nothing of the proposition, to which it
owe sits existence, has no referent? Rather the reverse. We should say not that the absence of
a referent brings with it the absence of a correlate for the statement but that it is the correlate
of the statement -- that to which it refers, not only what is said, but also what it speaks of, its
"theme" -- which makes it possible to say whether or not the proposition has a referent: it
alone decides this in a definitive way' (pages 89-90).
Aren't you glad I'm here? You thought my stuff was bullshit?]
So we need to examine operational fields rather than any kind of 'atom'.Foucault admits that
his use of the term discourse has been ambiguous up to now, referring to a group of verbal
performances, and acts of formulation,and a collection of statements. We can make use of
these three definitions as stages to explain both continuity and dispersion, and we should end
up with the final definition of discourse as 'the group of statements that belong to a single
system of formation' (page 107), hence clinical discourses, economic discourses and so on.
The point is that relations are always implied in a discourse, relations to objects, via the offer
of a number of subject positions to other elements in a field, and to material institutions.This
solves some problems but it is now not so easy to isolate statements which do not functionlike sentences.
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Foucault is keen to deny that he wants to reveal hidden meanings behind discourses, and says
he wants to perform an historical analysis of emergence. One way to begin this is to see
discourses as polysemic where some possible meanings have been repressed but there are
other analyses too, and this one operates at a secondary level (page 110). Repression of this
kind still depends on enunciation in the first place -- first you have to describe the enunciative
field itself, and only then can you go on to analyse the suspicious lack of alternatives found in
concrete discourses. A preliminary investigation is required of statements before utterances
are actually 'solidified'. Some description of an enunciative field is always implied in specific
analyses of works and texts. Analysis of sentences is only possible after sentences have
emerged in the domain of enunciation: sentences do not emerge directly from some 'primeval
night of silence' (page 112), and they all contain residual elements from this domain. This
transcendental level cannot itself be reduced to some simple source by materialist or humanist
analysis.
How does all this relate to the earlier work? Foucault undertook his archaeology in order to
try and regularise his insights and proceed 'without flaw, without contradiction, without
internal arbitrariness' (page 114) [ a typically scholastic agenda]. The point was only to
establish a possibility, and not to found a full theory. The point was to see how statements
were linked in a discourse, not sentences with linguistic rules, nor propositions with logical
ones, nor formulations with psychological rules (page 115). So what were the rules are to
describe various relations, like those between subject positions and domains? How were theyinstitutionalised and actually used?
The search for rules led him to the notion of a discursive formation .There seemed to be 4
aspects of such a formation -- the formation of objects, concepts, subject positions and
strategic choices. These correspond to the 4 domains of the enunciative function outlined
above. Together they provide a number of possibilities to explain both continuity and
dispersions, at both the general and individual level.
Another definition of discourse follows: 'a group of statements in so far as they belong to a
discursive formation', and this is contrasted to some ideal form that mutates over time.
Discursive practice now becomes a body of rules for the operation of the specific enunciative
function (page 117).
The result is a triumph for his analysis of 'concentric circles', going out to discourse and in to
statements. There are clear dangers of tautology, though.
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Discourses refer both to some totality, some 'great, uniform text' expressed in lots of specific
ones (including institutions), and to open possibilities of plural meanings, since 'each
discourse has the power to say... other than what it actually says' (page 118). The real interest
lies in how particular enunciations arise:
1. There is a law of rarity' (page 118), which yields a 'distribution of gaps, voids leads,
absences are, limits, divisions' (page 119).This does not depend on some hidden process of
repression, however, there is no depth mechanism: we are describing a process of localisation.
Rare statements are reworked, duplicated, extended, translated, and commented upon, and
then those products themselves generate new meanings. There is an inherent political strugglehere, since statements are seen as assets to be struggled over. This is in stark contrast to the
idea that there is an infinite wealth of meaning available in cultural traditions, as in
hermeneutics.
2. There is systematic exteriority, in contrast to the usual view of interpretation which tries
to move from external traces to internal meanings. This involves a view of the 'practical
domain' as autonomous rather than as a trace, as a configuration of anonymous fields rather
than as the acts of the subject. There is no cogito, no speaking subject, and no collective
consciousness behind the 'totality of things said' (122).
3. Accumulation of statements takes place not in a memory or in some primary collection of
documents, both of which imply some notion of origin, but as the results of the history of how
the statements were established, used, forgotten or destroyed, and how they have accumulated
through specific forms and processes: subjective memory and the repression of it 'are merely
unique figures' in this history (124)
So we must avoid any simple notions of a return to origins, and deny any teleology.Instead,
we must establish a 'positivity'.[Foucault flirts with this term here, saying he will accept he is
a positivist if that means abandoning the transcendental level of analysis -- page 125].
This is a descriptive task, focusing on concrete unities rather than underlying truths, operating
somewhere between a science and an oeuvre. This leads to a necessary 'historical a priori'
(127), as a 'condition of reality for statements' (128) [I think this means that we are going to
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privilege history, albeit specific histories, when we try to explain the generation of
statements]. Discourses can relate to this condition of reality in different ways, and we need to
tell the story of 'points of contact, places of insertion, irruption or emergence, domains or
occasions of operation' (128). These events are not just contingent connections. Systems of
statements,in all their dispersion, produce archives, and these in turn produce regularities.
Archives offer a 'law of what can be said' (129). They provide rules to group statements,
systems to enable enunciation and preserve the differences between discourses which make
them specific. Archives operate between some general system of language and the concrete
corpus of actual works, and guide the practice that generates, forms and transforms
statements. [We are talking about a kind of virtual archive here, not an actual collection of
documents]. An archive can never be fully described, and it appears only in fragmentary form.
It has a real effect, though, in limiting our activities and our analyses. The archive alludes to
discontinuity and difference rather than underlying unity [because it is a mere collection of
approaches?]. Thus difference is at the centre of reason, history, and ourselves. Archaeology
is therefore the correct process to use, instead of some search for an origin. Archaeology is 'a
description that questions the already-said at the level of its existence: of the enunciative
function, of the discursive formation, and the general archive system to which it belongs.
Archaeology describes discourses as practices specified in the elements of the archive' (131).
Part 4
What can archaeology actually offer [Foucault offers some delightfully modest self doubt on
pages 135-7]. It needs to separate itself from the history of ideas. This is far too sloppy,
concerning itself with 'shapeless works' and 'unrelated themes'. Archaeology tries to show
how the disciplines emerge, how their boundaries are constituted, and how concepts diffuse. It
is also interested in 'interdiscursive configurations' too, which are usually called
epistemological generalities.
Foucault admits that his own earlier work is limited. For example, he decided deliberately notto explore concepts such as zeitgeist [spirit of the age] or weltanschauung [collective world
view], but admits that he did so on principle, rather than following an investigation. He denies
that his concepts here are claiming some privilege, and insists that they represent only one
possibility [so they are arbitrary?] (159). He asks his readers to undertake 'the test of
analysis' [some naive pragmatism?].
Archaeology is 'not a science, a rationality a mentality a culture' [with 'a' emphasised each
time] (159). It offers a comparative analysis designed to show diversity [But why is diversity
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so important?].'What archaeology wishes to uncover is primarily... the play of analogies and
differences' (160), to show:
1. Archaeological isomorphisms [things of similar shape] between different discursive
elements at the level of rules.
2. How these rules operate to produce different formations
3. How different concepts are endowed with significance and shaped by archives,and occupy
similar positions (161)
4. How a single notion can cover two archaeologically distinct elements [to expose hidden
contradictions?]
5. How 'relations of subordination or complementarity... [are] established' (161) The issue
is to find what makes these possible rather than how they have actually occurred [somestrange notion of practice without a subject?]
6. How configurations of interpositivity' form, which is a fancy way of referring to the law
of communication between discourses.
Exploring relations between discourses and formations, and non-discursive domains [But
isn't everything discourse?] leads to an interest in 'institutions, political events, economic
practices and processes' (162). This should be descriptive rather than an attempt to interpret
or describe causality: 'symbolic analysis', or 'causal analysis' of things like medical discourse
offers merely a series of readings. Foucault wants something more fundamental, how
political or economic factors 'take part in the conditions of emergence, insertion and
functioning' of a discourse (163). How might they delimit objects? For example, political
developments led to new issues for medicine, such as the need to control conscript armies.
Another issue concerns how the status of the doctor emerged, and what functions were
ascribed to medical discourses in the managements of various conflicts among the
professionals.It is not a matter of how politics influences medical concepts or theoretical
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structures, but more to do with how 'medical discourse as a practice... [was]...articulated on to
practices that are external to it, and which are not themselves of a discursive order' (164).
[OK,but this seems like a very abstract and scholastic project to me, despite all the emphasis
on practice. The projec tof showing how politics influences medical concepts seems far more
interesting and relevant!]
Does archaeology freeze history? Foucault denies the relevance of simple chronologies,but
not the effects of time. He does describe articulations over time, such as how things become
operationalised in to statements, or how the mobility of discourses takes place, but these are
not just driven by events: on thecontrary, the relation to events varies according to particular
discourses at work (168).. There is a sense of succession or development,but this is not
always chronological. Time is never a simple determinant, according to some 'original
calendar', usually based on linear speech and the stream of consciousness. There is a need to
undo simple histories and expose all the glosses which cover over differences. There are
different types of differences anyway, such as primary ones, localised versus general,or
transforming.
Foucault wants to deny that transformations are authored or caused, both of which reduce
specificity by deploying some single notion such as the'living force of change'.
Transformations can be uneven, are seldom revolutionary and complete, and these
continuities are also of interest [which denies the notion of a simple tradition]. The idea of an
'active continuousness' (174) is used to deny a view of history as a series of eras or
watersheds. Discourses vary in their reactions to temporality [which leads to an interesting
aside on the epistemological break in marxism. Foucault says there are different notions of
epistemological breaks as well, and different effects -- compare the one inaugurated when
Marx broke with Ricardo to the one identified by Althusser between the early and late works
of Marx].
Archaeology seems to apply to Foucault's own limited examples, but what of any wider
implications? What about natural science? Archaeology is not about specific disciplines as
such, but about positivities, and discursive formations are not the same as established
disciplines either. Discursive formations are larger and more general than individual
disciplines, and can be shared between them, as is psychiatry and law in Madness...
Discursive practices also preceded disciplines, and are manifested in other sites as well.
However positivities sometimes do turn into sciences, and discursive practices sometimes do
act as proto-disciplines.
Positivities are not forms of knowledge nor just a collection of acceptable knowledges, but arethe effects of discursive rules. They are not necessarily sciences. Rules are not just prototypes
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or some archaic stage of a discipline. They are best thought of as knowledge itself ['in
general', one might think?], produced by a disciplinary practice, a space for subject positions,
a field of co-ordination and subordination of statements in which concepts appear' (182), a
set of relations of use and appropriation [Do you find any of these stylish but flatulent
metaphors of any use?]. These practices, spaces, fields or sets can be independent of specific
sciences, but not of discourse.
It might be possible to see sciences as a selection from knowledge, operating with rather
stricter criteria? Archaeology explores territories beyond scientific domains, such as those
shared by literature and philosophy. So how does science emerge?
1. It is a selection from knowledge, a local region in knowledge. Its boundaries vary as an
effective discursive formations. The function of science is the important issue rather than the
science/ideology issue [which Althusser had made central]. Turning to that [rather hastily I
thought], science and ideology share features as discursive practices. Thereis no sharp
distinction between them, but the level of discursive formation is decisive. Whether one uses
causal explanations is irrelevant, and it is not just a matter of rigour. [Having disposed of
that], the ideological role of science is established by looking at 'the system of formation of its
objects, its types of enunciation, its concepts, its theoretical choices' (186). [So a great deal of
wriggling must take place here. Both science and ideology are discourses, but we do not wantto let anyone say that therefore they are of equal value -- we have not yet got to post-
modernism. So we assert some differences, and claim they are important. But this is really
very near the end of the book, and we have not mentioned these crucial differences before but
have stayed at a very general and abstract level indeed. By the time we have got to these
crucial specific differences, we have done enough theorising, and there is time and space
enough only to jot down a few remarks].
2. Discursive forms emerge first as positivities [practices become autonomous andsystematised first?]. Then there is a stage on the 'threshold of epistemologisation', when
norms are clarified and begin to function as a model. Then formal criteria and logical
explicitness develop,on the 'threshold of scientificity'. Further definitions of axioms,
propositions,and rules of transformation leave us on the threshold of 'formalisation' (187).The
way these develop and interlock can vary: there are no neat periodisations,and stages 1 and 2
can be mixed, for example. Mathematics seems to have crossed all the thresholds at once,
which is why it is often taken as a model for the development of a discipline.
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3. So distinct histories are possible. There can be a history of formalisation, and one of
scientificity. [Bachelard and Canguilhem are much admired here]. Such histories are often
situated within science itself, and thus tend to be saturated with terms like truth and error,
rational and non rational. A history can stop at the stage of epistemologisation -- not all
discursive formations lead to sciences.
4. Analysing the dynamics within discursive formations and positivities leads to an analysis
of the episteme itself, the relations that unite... the discursive practices that give rise to
epistemological figures, sciences and... formalised systems' (191). These affect the different
thresholds and the paths between them. An episteme is more than a form of knowledge or
type of rationality, but is best seen as an 'indefinite field of relations', including relations with
other fields. This varies over time. It gives the right to be a science, not as a one-off gift, but
as an historical practice again.
Is archaeology right to focus on this episteme? Other kindsof archaeology are possible: do we
need, say, an archaeology of sexuality which would involve not only the science of sexuality,
but also a field of possible enunciations in its own right? Should we not be oriented to ethical
rather than epistemic issues? What about political knowledge? Foucault says that he is
interested in the emergence of sciences in particular for several reasons -- because they are
emerging strongly these days, because it is an important political task to criticise science, butprincipally because they demonstrate best the points about positivity.
Conclusion
This offers one of those dialogues, in which Foucault replies to some imaginary questions:
Do we need, concepts rather than structuralist analysis? Surely concepts like langue and
parole would deal with the issue of how specific discourses arise? Discourses seem to be very
context bound: surely they express the relations between real successive events?
Analysing discourses reveal their identity and diversity, and there are a number of ways to
grasp them, as well as using structural and interpretative approaches. The intention here is to
reveal [micropolitical] possibilities.
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Surely we cannot do without teleology and subjectivity as unifying themes? Some discourses,
such as structuralism,are already capable of generalising about other discourses. Surely
current theoretical practice is immune from charges of historical specificity?
Some sort of break from ideology into science seems to be promised here,with an implicit
view that new forms of reason are transcendental. I aimed to analyse the past to exhibit
irreducible discontinuity and dispersion,the impossibility of transcendentalism. Attempts to
deny this application to the present stem from a desire to defend the consciousness of the
subject,and there are elements of special pleading [a number of attacks against his
Archaeology are summarised, page 204], and a hint that this debate is all about boundary
maintenance.
What legitimates Foucault's discourse? Is he offering a naively positivist description? Is it all
subjective? 'Either [your discourse] does not reach us, or we claim it' (page 205). Is it history
or philosophy?
There is no attempt to find some hidden law in discourses. There is a genuine attempt to
describe dispersion and decentring, to make differences, constitute new theoretical objects.
This is neither history nor philosophy.
It is not science either! The claims made are still in their infancy. The project tends to define
what it is not, always postponing systematisation,always claiming to be a new research
programme. Isn't it likely to die with its author?
This project is a survey of concrete research rather than a scientific plan, although it is related
to science [via the reconstruction of the sciences it analyses?] It is scientific in that it is
interested in performance [politics?] rather than mere linguistic competence. Sciences areseen as possibilities within this overall archaeology, 'correlative spaces' (page 207), although
we might find a general theory of productions eventually. The project aims to occupy a
specific domain, which could be unstable: the problems could be better grasped by some other
discipline; it could be a false start; it could die with the author.
While arguing that all other discourses are constrained, are you not claiming a revolutionary
freedom for yourself?
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Positivities should not be seen as closed forms of determination. Instead they constitute a
field, a set of rules, relations or supports. They describe pragmatics rather than logics.
Discourses should be seen as practices rathert han just linguistic expressions. Discourses can
change, but not only via subjects.Notions like evolution or essentialism deny the impact of
political changes,and see discourses as transparent bearers of subjective meanings.This is a
pleasurable view, and we like to think of ourselves as subjects.It is irritating to have to
deconstruct instead. It is also nice to want to banish death via discourse (page 210) -- if there
is no interior,is everything else indifferent? There is no real response to this except
sympathy!
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