Power,Freedom, and Individuality: Foucault and Sexual Difference |
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Authors: | Email author" target="_blank">Miri?RozmarinEmail author |
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Institution: | (1) Philosophy Department, Tel-Aviv University, Ramat-Aviv, Israel |
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Abstract: | This paper offers a detailed account of Foucault s ethical and political notion of individuality as presented in his late work, and discusses its relationship to the feminist project of the theory of sexual difference. I argue that Foucault s elaboration of the classical ethos of care for the self opens the way for regarding the I-woman as an ethical, political and aesthetic self-creation. However, it has significant limitations that cannot be ignored. I elaborate on two aspects of Foucault s avoidance of sexual difference as a relevant category for an account of political and ethical individuality, which thus implicitly associates individual agency with men. I argue that Foucault implicitly assumes the existence of an ontological desire to become engaged in political self-creation. However, the ethical position of self-knowledge and desire should be understood as a contingent option that depends on material and historical conditions for its realization. Hence, I argue that a feminist reworking of Foucault s notion of political individuality should add a substantial ethical condition to the imperative of self-knowledge and self-creation – making possible the desiring woman subject. |
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Keywords: | foucault freedom individuality power sexual difference subjectivity |
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