Progressive Geographies

Michel Foucault, “Discourse and Truth” and “Parresia” – University of Chicago Press, July 2019.

This volume collects a series of lectures given by the renowned French thinker Michel Foucault late in his career. The book is composed of two parts: a series of lectures entitled “Discourse and Truth” given at the University of California, Berkeley in 1983 and “Parrēsia,” a talk delivered at the University of Grenoble in 1982. Together, they provide an unprecedented account of Foucault’s reading of the Greek concept of parrēsia, often translated as “truth-telling” or “frank speech.” In typically Foucauldian style, the lectures trace the transformation of this concept across Greek, Roman, and early Christian thought, from its origins in pre-Socratic Greece to its role as a central element of the relationship between teacher and student across a range of societies. In mapping the concept’s history, Foucault’s concern is not to advocate for free speech; rather, his aim is to explore the moral and political position one must occupy in order to speak truthfully. In his analysis of parrēsia, Foucault both advances his project of a history of the present and paves the way for a genealogy of the critical attitude in modern and contemporary societies.

These essays—carefully edited and including notes and introductory material to fully illuminate Foucault’s insights—are a major addition to Foucault’s English language corpus that no scholar of ancient or modern philosophy will want to miss.

If this seems familiar, then that’s not surprising. It is a critical edition of the text previously published as Fearless Speech, and the Grenoble lecture previously appeared in Critical Inquiry. It’s the English equivalent of Discours et vérité, which appeared in 2016 with Vrin. The Fearless Speech book was unauthorised, and the seminars were transcribed from recordings – [update: they are also incomplete; see Daniel Lorenzini’s comment below]. For this volume, they are reedited, [corrected and completed] and supplemented by Foucault’s manuscripts. There is also a good amount of critical apparatus.

Return to Foucault’s “What is an Author” – Gordon Hull at New APPS

I’m teaching a Foucault seminar this term, and one of the things I’m trying to do is get better on the doxography of his essays.  That led me to a discovery about “What is an Author” that I’m going to share on the (hopefully not hubristic) assumption that other folks didn’t know it either.  The essay has been of interest to me for a while, largely because of my work on intellectual property.  There, the link between copyright and the juridico-political function of authorship Foucault identifies is fairly clear, and has been ably explored in the context of trademark by Laura Heymann.

What I didn’t know is that Foucault’s essay was originally presented as a seminar (Feb. 1969) – with responses from the likes of Lucien Goldmann and Lacan.  The version translated into English and that makes its way into the Rabinow-edited Foucault Reader and subsequent English editions is based on a revised version that Foucault gave the following year in Buffalo.  As a result, we don’t get the commentaries.  The version in Dits & Écrits I (#69) is thus worth a look for a few reasons. [continues here]

I posted about this text by Foucault in 2017, where I provide a list of the variant texts in French and English translation – The textual issues around Foucault’s ‘What is an Author?’ There is no complete English translation of the text, but there are other versions than the one in The Foucault Reader, including one which translates some, but not all, of the discussion.

None of this takes away from Hull’s interesting discussion, but it might provide some useful detail and references for those who want to go beyond the partial translation.