Reading Foucault: Lectures at the Collège de France (Spring 2011)

STS 6534: Reading Foucault: Lectures at the Collège de France

Spring Semester 2011

*Feb. 1 Abnormal, 1-166, Hyunkyoung Cho

[Fig 1] “Symbiosis,” Interactive Artwork constituted by the collaborative action of technology and human

The Redoubling (reproduction) of Abnormality by the Abnormalization of the Normal

From the History of Philosophical Thought to the History of Systems of Thought

1. What is the system of thought?

: Actor-Network performed by the inter-acting between actants.

In general, system indicates a composition having several parts or members. If we borrow Bruno Latour’s theory, the concept of system in Foucauldian insight can be understood as Actor-Network performed by the inter-acting between actants; the characteristic of actant is that one actant acts only if another actant reacts. It means that the system emphasizes the performance of relationship as the integrated whole that can be also be stated in terms of an act-network embodying relationships of actants.

2. What is the problem of system of thought?

: The production of Abnormality

The lecture, “Abnormal (1974-1975),” its announced topic is ‘the emergence of the abnormal individual in the nineteenth century.’ It is to overcome the binary system, the dual frame; Beyond the distinction between abnormal and normal, through the historical reflection on the reality of the soul; Production and reproduction of the abnormality of the abnormal individual by the abnormalization of the normal individual. It implies the emergence of new method of production of psychiatric power; the abnormalization of the normal in the correlation with the power (of techniques) of normalization, through the psychiatric expert opinion (uttering/utterance).

3. So, why doctor? Answer: Because he knows.

1) The system of thought is the historical reality of the soul.

“Foucault’s “soul” is very real.” It is endowed with not the metaphysical and transcendental reality, but with a historical reality that is the correlative of a certain technology of power on the body (and of the procedures of knowledge that arise from and reinforce these relations of power).

2) The historical reality of the soul is productive (performative).

Its existence can be understood as the evolution of technology of power as productive.

In the correlation with the technology of power, it takes on the form of the psyche or personality, with its gradation from normal to abnormal, where everyone becomes a psychiatric object, an object that can be psychiatrized. In this sense, we can say that the technology of power as productive creates the dangerous individual, through the technique of normalization situated by the authority responsible for the control of abnormal individual.

To put it differently, 3) the psychiatric power produces the abnormal/dangerous individual; madness/madman; monstrosity/monster. The redoubling of abnormality by the abnormalization of normality: As the functioning of power of normalization, the psychiatric expert opinion guarantees the power to separate between the normal and the abnormal, and controls the abnormal individual in the name of the public enemy. In this process, the individual is replaced with the dangerous individual, the psychiatric object that must to be normalized, since he/she is the monster, the undisciplined, or onanist.