Category Archives: Books

Boris Porshnev – from peasant revolts in 17th century France to cryptozoology and the quest for the Soviet Yeti

Posted on December 14, 2025 by stuartelden

I first read the work of the Soviet historian Boris Fyodorovich Porshnev because of Michel Foucault. (His name is sometimes transliterated, especially in France, as Porchnev.) In his 1971-72 Collège de France lectures, Penal Theories and Institutions, Foucault spends the first … Continue reading →

Posted in Boris Porshnev, Foucault: The Birth of Power, Michel Foucault, Sunday Histories, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

100 years since the Locarno Treaties and territorial integrity today

Posted on November 30, 2025 by stuartelden

On 1 December 1925, the Locarno Treaties were signed by Germany, France, Great Britain, Belgium and Italy, with some of the additional treaties also including Poland and Czechoslovakia as signatories. Negotiated in Switzerland in October, the final signing was in … Continue reading →

Posted in Jean Gottmann, Politics, Sunday Histories, Territory, Terror and Territory, The Birth of Territory, Uncategorized | 1 Comment

Michel Foucault’s 24 May 1979 paper on hermaphrodites to the Arcadie conference

Posted on November 26, 2025 by stuartelden

An earlier piece discussed the recently published Les Hermaphrodites, a manuscript by Foucault from the mid-late 1970s, at one point destined for a volume of the History of Sexuality. I also outlined the different plans Foucault discussed for the structure of the History of Sexuality series – … Continue reading →

Posted in Foucault's Last Decade, Michel Foucault, Paul Veyne, Sunday Histories, Uncategorized | 2 Comments

Foucault’s Multiple Plans for his History of Sexuality

Posted on November 16, 2025 by stuartelden

Some years ago, Philippe Chevallier alerted me to the importance of the 1977 German translation of the first volume of Foucault’s History of Sexuality as Sexualität und Wahrheit: Der Wille zum Wissen. This text included a brief preface by Foucault … Continue reading →

Posted in Foucault's Last Decade, Michel Foucault, Sunday Histories, Uncategorized | 1 Comment

Indo-European Thought in Twentieth-Century France update 30 – archive work in Paris, Bern and Cambridge, MA, and Benveniste’s library

Posted on November 12, 2025 by stuartelden

The formal end of the Leverhulme major research fellowship for the Indo-European thought project was at the end of September, but I have a no-cost extension until the end of January. This is invaluable, and is effectively to extend the grant for … Continue reading →

Posted in Étienne Wolff, Claude Lévi-Strauss, David Harvey, Emile Benveniste, Ernst Kantorowicz, Erwin Panofsky, Georges Bataille, Georges Canguilhem, Georges Dumézil, Jacques Derrida, Mapping Indo-European Thought in Twentieth Century France, Michel Foucault, Pierre Bourdieu, Roman Jakobson, Sunday Histories, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Foucault’s Hermaphrodites – from Herculine Barbin to a planned volume of the History of Sexuality and the recently published manuscript

Posted on November 2, 2025 by stuartelden

In May 1978, Foucault edited the memoir of a “hermaphrodite”, Herculine Barbin, for publication. In the dossier of documents appended to that text he says that “the question of strange destinies like these and which posed such problems for medicine … Continue reading →

Posted in Étienne Wolff, Canguilhem (book), Foucault's Last Decade, Georges Canguilhem, Michel Foucault, Sunday Histories, The Archaeology of Foucault | 4 Comments

Joseph Falaky Nagy review of the new edition of Georges Dumézil, Mitra-Varuna: An Essay on Two Indo-European Representations of Sovereignty (both review and book open access)

Posted on October 27, 2025 by stuartelden

Joseph Falaky Nagy generously reviews the new edition of Georges Dumézil, Mitra-Varuna: An Essay on Two Indo-European Representations of Sovereignty, trans. Derek Coltman, ed. Stuart Elden, from Hau Books in Journal of Folklore Research Reviews. Both the journal and the … Continue reading →

Posted in Georges Dumézil, Mapping Indo-European Thought in Twentieth Century France, My Publications | Leave a comment

The Andrea Rosenthal Memorial Lecture – “Émile Benveniste, the Second World War and the Making of the Vocabulary of Indo-European Institutions”, Brown University, 22 October 2025, 5.30pm

Posted on October 22, 2025 by stuartelden

The Andrea Rosenthal Memorial Lecture – “Émile Benveniste, the Second World War and the Making of the Vocabulary of Indo-European Institutions”, Brown University, 22 October 2025, 5.30pm The Comparative Literature Department cordially invites you to join us for Émile Benveniste, the … Continue reading →

Posted in Conferences, Emile Benveniste, Mapping Indo-European Thought in Twentieth Century France | 1 Comment

From a Watershed to the Parting of the Waters: A Note on Michel Foucault and Peter Brown

Posted on October 5, 2025 by stuartelden

Back in November 2014, while I was researching Foucault’s Last Decade, I wrote “A minor note on Michel Foucault and Peter Brown: From a watershed to the parting of the waters” for this site. I was interested in Foucault’s use of an idea … Continue reading →

Posted in Foucault's Last Decade, Michel Foucault, Peter Brown, Sunday Histories | 3 Comments

Étienne Wolff and the biology of monsters – writing as a prisoner of war, Collège de France administrator, and the engagement with his work by Georges Canguilhem, Georges Bataille and Michel Foucault

Posted on September 21, 2025 by stuartelden

In exploring the histories of professors and their teaching at the Collège de France, I’ve often looked at correspondence between chairs, candidates and the administrator. Administrators are elected from within the professoriate and have quite a lot of power in … Continue reading →

Posted in Alexandre Koyré, Étienne Wolff, Canguilhem (book), Fernand Braudel, Georges Bataille, Georges Canguilhem, Michel Foucault, Sunday Histories, The Archaeology of Foucault, Uncategorized | 6 Comments