Edward Said and Michel Foucault.Research in African Literatures

Edward Said and Michel Foucault: Affinities and DissonancesKARLIS RACEVSKIS The Ohio State University A BST R ACT Edward Said played a key role in introducing Foucault’s work to academics in the United States. While this initial appreciation of Foucault’s thought was also reflected in his own work, it was not to last, however. Said’s growing disenchantment with Foucault’s thinking is reflected in the many essays he wrote and the interviews he gave over the years following the publication of Orientalism. At the same time, while Said’s reflections point to his reasons for rejecting a Foucaultian approach to texts and the world, they also reveal a number of misunderstandings regarding Foucault’s purpose. Said would eventually rectify these misperceptions and offer an eloquent and succinct analysis of Foucault’s contribution to contemporary critical theory in the last essay he wrote on the French thinker. dward Said has acknowledged the existence of a fundamental paradox at the heart of his critical enterprise and he credited James Clifford with having disclosed it, earlier than anyone else. It was, as Said explains it, “the conflict between my avowed and unmistakable humanistic bias and the antihumanism of my subject and my approach toward it” (Humanism and Democratic Criticism 8). The source of the discrepancy, evidently, was Said’s reliance on a particular kind of advanced theory—Michel Foucault’s, to be exact—that Clifford had perceptively characterized, in Said’s estimation, “as having largely disposed of humanism’s essentializing and totalizing modes” (9). The paradox becomes even more pronounced when we take into account Said’s leading role in promoting Foucault and his thought in this country. Said’s first essays on Michel Foucault appeared as early as 1971 and 1972 eventually constituting an important chapter in Beginnings.1 While the chapter is devoted to a general discussion as well as a critical evaluation of what Said characterizes as “contemporary French thought,” that is, of what could generally be subsumed under the label of “structuralism,” its main focus is clearly on Foucault. Said describes him as a thinker to be credited with the creation of “a new mental domain—not history, RESEARCH IN AFRICAN LITER ATURES, Vol. 36, No. 3 (Fall 2005). © 2005 E the book also revealed areas of theoretical divergence between the two thinkers. he did not fall prey to the “linguacentricity” that was a general and—to Said’s mind—a regrettable characteristic of structuralist thought.” that is. curiously enough. and others” (378). “Foucault and Deleuze rejoin the adversarial epistemological current found in Vico. As intellectuals. the other is the distinction to be made between an objective and a subjective knowledge. or anybody’s method to override what I was trying to put forward” (137). Williams. Said himself would eventually recognize that the book was indeed theoretically inconsistent. “which is problematic for Said in a way that it is not for the French philosopher” (27–28). Thus Said appears to alternate “between the idea that true representation is theoretically possible and the opposite position that all representation is necessarily misrepresentation” (29). mentioning the importance of The Archaeology of Knowledge and Discipline and Punish in particular (3). One of the causes for his growing disenchantment with Foucault had to do with the question of Palestine. In the preface to Orientalism. “without Foucault’s concepts of discourse and of discursive formations. It is indeed possible to suppose that Orientalism. as Valerie Kennedy suggests. and also in the radical political writings of Chomsky. was that “I didn’t want Foucault’s method. Kennedy detects “two major inconsistencies in Said’s use of Foucault’s concept of discourse”: one concerns the question of representation and its relationship to truth. The French philosopher Gilles Deleuze was another thinker who rejected the subject as ground for certainty. Kolko. in Fanon. It is not clear whether the approach developed as he was writing Orientalism or whether it became apparent only in retrospect. Said was invited to a seminar on the question of peace in the Middle East organized by Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir in Paris. the rejection of the Cartesian paradigm for establishing the truth of knowledge in terms of a Cogito—an inherent quality of the mind giving humans the capacity for gauging objectively the world. to make truth as an issue secondary to the successful ordering and wielding of huge masses of actual present knowledge” (291). his discussions of the relationships between power and knowledge. but ‘archeology’ and ‘discourse’—and a new habit of thought. although Foucault himself was not a participant. The seminar turned out . The seminar. he explained to Imre Salusinszky some eight years later. was held in Foucault’s apartment. in Marx and Engels. He went so far as to suggest that by the end of the book he had developed an approach “which was deliberately anti-Foucault” (137). and his view that representations are always influenced by the systems of power in which they are located” (25). At the same time. Although the refusal to take human consciousness as the ground for true knowledge was something Foucault shared with other French thinkers. the book most responsible for Said’s prominence in the field of postcolonial studies. Said recognizes his debt to Foucault. The main reason for this. claiming that “I designed it that way” (Criticism in Society 137). This initial appreciation of Foucault’s theories would be reflected in Said’s own theoretical approach. In the spring of 1979.84 RESEARCH IN AFRICAN LITER ATURES nor philosophy. a set of rules for knowledge to dominate truth. Said therefore finds both Foucault and Deleuze justified in “seeing their philosophy of decenterment as revolutionary” and places them in the lineage of a distinguished tradition of radical thinkers. Bertrand Russell. The key to this reversal in the traditional priority truth had always been given over knowledge is what Said calls “the loss of the subject. William A. what is evident is that his initial enthusiasm for Foucault’s ideas had waned considerably by the time of the interview with Salusinszky. in Lukacs. could not have been written. P. The critic.2 In addition to these real or perceived political discordances. Foucault expressing support for Israel. literary theory turned into mainly an academic exercise and “retreated into a labyrinth of ‘textuality. In this regard. the Text. in Marrouchi. is situated between Text and World and his or her responsibility is to reveal the connections linking the two in order to advance such . He notes. in the same interview. “In the late ’80s. Unfortunately. The highlight of the gathering was a presentation by Sartre. the source of the intellectual effervescence marking the ’50s and ’60s in France had been a desire to transform society. “I was told by Gilles Deleuze that he and Foucault. More specifically. and the Critic contributed to further solidify Said’s position as critic by outlining what could be considered his credo as a politically engaged intellectual. were guilty of the latest version of a trahison des clercs. No wonder then that he hadn’t wanted to discuss the Middle East with me” (qtd. “I could tell he was withdrawing from politics. he adds. The World. there were also philosophical and theoretical differences of which Said was becoming increasingly conscious at the time.” As a result. Said was to discover that what he had interpreted as a lack of interest in politics had actually been Foucault’s way of avoiding a discussion about the Palestinians. The influence of Derrida and Foucault was understandably the most dangerous of all—precisely because of their “canonization”—and. it was while reading E.3 He notes that. had clashed fatally because of their differences over Palestine. that his encounter with Foucault took place at a time when he was discovering some basic flaws in Foucault’s notion of a disciplinary society in particular. in Said’s view. Thompson’s The Making of the English Working Class that he became convinced that there was something more to society than “just the smooth working out of a massive system of domination. Edward Said at the Limits 92). Said’s position on the responsibility of critics as well as his views on their alleged treason can be formulated most readily in terms of the concepts making up the book’s title. the book that followed Orientalism can be read most profitably for the many rationalizations and justifications it offers as reasons for definitely rejecting a Foucaultian approach to either texts or the world. to put it simply.” Said remembers. “he had lost interest in politics” (101).” Said recalls. there was “not a word about the Palestinians!” (75) Said did meet Foucault on this occasion but the conversation he had with him was also very disappointing. “I separated from Foucault at that point” (Interviews 101). Deleuze for the Palestinians. according to Said. The book of essays also presents what could be termed a systematic critique of all those contemporaries who. a spectrum of intellectual innovations in which he was all the more disappointed because it had seemed so promising at first. The qualifier “sadly enough” sums up Said’s experience with French theory. to Said’s amazement.’ dragging along with it the most recent apostles of European revolutionary textuality—Derrida and Foucault—whose trans-Atlantic canonization and domestication they themselves seemed sadly enough to be encouraging” (The World 3). Said was intent on devoting more time to these two critics than to anyone else in his book. originally. judging by the length of the list of entries in the index.K ARLIS R ACEVSKIS 85 to be deeply disappointing and Said was forced to conclude that de Beauvoir and Sartre “knew nothing about the Arab world and were both fantastically pro-Israel” (Interviews with Edward Said 75). as it gained in popularity and—especially—after it found itself transplanted to the United States. Years later. once the closest of friends.” but. who “talked for fifteen or twenty minutes on how great Anwar Sadat was. and Ohmann. for Said. texts from everything that is hors texte. among which “Foucault is one. who have been left to the hands of “free” market forces. . What literary critics often fail to realize. racial hatred. What makes Foucault’s approach clearly distinguishable from Derrida’s is his attempt to make “the text assume its affiliations with institutions. agencies. the text’s material conditions of emergence and deployment. for example.” which. The point. and so forth” (169). economic and behavioral manipulation?” (177).” In addition. Said finds that “our critical ethos is formed by a pernicious analytic of blind demarcation by which. This is also why literary critics have been remarkably silent on such questions as “to what degree has culture collaborated in the worst excesses of the State. Thus. is to devise and provide concrete solutions and practical answers to “the questions that trouble the reader of a daily newspaper. groups. the principal culprit to be blamed for these developments was obviously Derrida. ideologically defined parties and professions” (212). that is. disguise. Said argues. culture from power. guilds. history from form. truth. Thus. classes. Offering a diagnosis of the ills besetting the practice of literary criticism. by elucidating the connections linking discursive with nondiscursive power/knowledge networks or. serves as a shorthand designation for the cultural process that serves to maintain a certain social order: it is the glue binding together the various components of a State providing it with its authority and justifying its power. the citizens of modern society. from its imperial wars and colonial settlements to its self-justifying institutions of antihuman repression. in addition. It is also when he examines the particular manner in which the two French critics deal with texts that Said discovers that “the divergence between Derrida and Foucault becomes very dramatic” (212). is that their practice has contributed to the establishment of a domain of critical practice called “literature” that is no longer aware of the legitimizing role it plays in society and. when he observes that contemporary Left criticism “is for the most part stunningly silent” about the collusion intellectuals engage into with the State’s almost absolute power. the critic most readily identified with what Said terms “the extraordinarily Laputan idea that to a certain extent everything can be regarded as a text” (173). “’literature’ as a cultural agency has become more and more blind to its actual complicities with power” (175). as a result. (4) As these remarks suggest. The main consequence of this blindness has been a general abdication of a responsibility Said considers to be implicit in the literary critic’s—or the humanist’s—calling: In having given up the world entirely for the aporias and unthinkable paradoxes of a text. In this particular regard. it is clear to Said that “Foucault’s greatest intellectual contribution is to an understanding of how the will to exercise dominant control in society and history has also discovered a way to clothe.86 RESEARCH IN AFRICAN LITER ATURES traditional humanistic aims as the pursuit of freedom. and Poulantzas. to put it differently. contemporary criticism has retreated from its constituency. multinational corporations. corporations. offices.” Said tells us (25). To do this. academies. the texte with the hors-texte—Foucault is able to take into account not only the semantic but also the material reality of the text. it is also evident that Said still gives a certain preference to Foucault. In other words. he is pleased to note that “feminist critics have opened up this question part of the way” (169).” he does mention exceptions to this sort of apathy or blindness. imagination is separated from thought. a critic must first understand his or her involvement with the “Text. the manipulations of consumer appetites. and justice. to open it up toward historical reality. It is nonetheless quite accurate in terms of Foucault’s own ideas about what he was hoping to accomplish as a critic.] It’s because I spent a certain amount of time in psychiatric hospitals that I wrote The Birth of the Clinic. But Said also finds reason to be critical of Foucault’s performance claiming that it illustrated “the disturbing circularity of Foucault’s theory of power.” Moreover. d’interférence. . Said judges equally disturbing the impression that “one could not imagine Foucault undertaking a sustained analysis of powerfully controlled political issues.” Said notes (142). To be sure.K ARLIS R ACEVSKIS 87 rarefy. utilitarian value. I always made certain that what happened in me and for me was a sort of coming and going. theorizing over the problem of textuality or . . . this is a rather astounding statement. . “But note. Said admires Georg Lukacs. like Chomsky himself and writers like John Berger. Thus. Nevertheless. “One is a philosopher. “that Foucault’s history is ultimately textual. “it is the critic’s job to provide resistances to theory. or rather textualized” (246). Thus he found it impossible to posit the sort of cause/effect relationship between his theorizing and historical and social change that Said believed could be effected. j’ai commencé à faire un certain nombre de choses et j’ai ensuite écrit Surveiller et Punir. and wrap itself systematically in the language of truth. because “theory for him was what consciousness produced. pain. of interference. practicing an alternate textuality of their own” (185). is that it could very well be applied to Foucault’s own views concerning the aims of the critic. In . toward society. who once debated Foucault on a special program for Dutch television moderated by the philosopher Fons Elders. toward human needs and interests. the disenfranchised. “the other a philosophic historian” (185). d’interconnection entre les activités pratiques et le travail théorique ou le travail historique que je faisais. discipline. not as an avoidance of reality but as a revolutionary will completely committed to worldliness and change” (234). however. . when all is said and done. What is striking about this statement. rationality. would Foucault commit himself to descriptions of power and oppression with some intention of alleviating human suffering. and although important differences do exist between the two French thinkers. According to Said. they both stand accused of practicing “textualism.” and doing it rather badly at that.] C’est pour avoir passé un certain temps dans les hôpitaux psychiatriques que j’ai écrit Naissance de la clinique. He found equally commendable the critical practice of Noam Chomsky. considering Foucault’s often reiterated and clearly demonstrated concern for the oppressed.” Said points out. Dans les prisons. nor. to point up those concrete instances drawn from everyday reality” (242). and knowledge” (216). Foucault frequently stressed the need to submit theory to the test of reality. Such a practice stands in marked contrast with that of other critics much more attuned to the world. and the marginalized. [.4 The debate mainly seemed to reveal the lack of a common ground of philosophical or epistemological assumptions—“neither Fons Elders nor his two guests appeared to be talking about the same thing most of the time.” he also reminds us. [. of practical everyday experiences: [J]’ai toujours tenu à ce qu’il se passe en moi et pour moi une sorte d’aller et venue. What Said ends up detecting in both Derrida and Foucault is “a fundamental uncertainty in their work as to what it is doing. or betrayed hope” (247). of interconnection between practical activities and the theoretical or historical work I was doing. . the academy. the Text. On one particular occasion. the Text. the Text. he had developed a growing resentment for many of the things to which. Said claims. and the Critic. by this time. Thus Foucault’s approach is seen as both deluded and intended to delude others because his theory of power. the hospital. Foucault’s affective investment in the subjects of his investigations is an aspect Said does not seem to take at all into consideration. in the prisons he visited. or betrayed hope. “has captivated not only Foucault himself but many of his readers” and mainly serves to “justify political quietism with sophisticated intellectualism” (245). It is possible that he was not able to appreciate Foucault’s deeply humane and compassionate involvement with the objects of research because.88 RESEARCH IN AFRICAN LITER ATURES prisons. Similarly. Politics. He was growing ever more impatient with what he construed to be a betrayal by leftist critics in general and Foucault—as one of the most visible of these—in particular. I began doing a certain number of things and then I wrote Discipline and Punish.] position. Foucault is also characterized as a man obsessed with a single idea or theme: he “becomes the scribe of domination” (138). Said offered what could be considered a fairly complete list of everything he thought was wrong with the direction Foucault’s thinking had taken since the late sixties. he is “at times hysterically anti-Marxist. could hardly be called “practicing textuality. and Culture 77). It’s certainly a less cynical position than Foucault’s”: Foucault’s alleged cynicism being attributable to the simple fact that he eventually became “uninterested in any direct political involvement of any sort” (Power. . and the Critic. he thought. It is a resentment that occasionally surfaces in The World. in his mind. and so on—moved from what appeared to be insurrectionary scholarship to a kind of scholarship that confronted the problem of power from the position of someone who believed that ultimately very little resistance was possible . It was a feeling of empathy that contrasted sharply. the prison. what struck Foucault most was the manner in which the act of confining human beings was taken as something perfectly natural. In an interview that was to be published under the title of “Overlapping Territories: The World. Said’s annoyance with what he sees as an academic exercise masquerading as radical or subversive thought emerges as well in the many interviews he gave over the years following the publication of The World. The naturalness of this power to subject others led him to reflect on the historical process that had yielded the necessary truths for justifying and institutionalizing procedures of confinement. Foucault recounts the suffering he experienced in a psychiatric hospital at the sight of the inmates’ suffering. for example. pain. . When invited to comment on the relative merits of Chomsky’s and Foucault’s critical practices. obviously.” In a radio interview given in 1975. Foucault’s critical methodology lent support.” and “everything is an aspect of the process of the carceral society for Foucault” (65). the army. as a procedure whose legitimacy was self-evident.” Said found it useful and revealing to contrast Foucault’s political stance with that of Frantz Fanon: Foucault’s trajectory as a scholar and researcher noted for his interest in sites of political intensity—the asylum. and the Critic. Said declared that “Chomsky’s is the more consistently honorable [. with the scientific detachment and seeming impassivity of the doctors (Dits et écrits 2: 783–802). Said shows himself to be equally misguided or misinformed when he reproaches Foucault of a complete lack of concern for “human suffering. (Dits et écrits 4: 748) Such a procedure. in borrowing from such revolutionary intellectuals as Fanon. in essence. contrary to what Said asserts. Said contrasts once more the political stance of Foucault with that of Fanon. the types of discourse which it accepts and makes function as true’ (Dits et écrits 3: 158). . Gramsci. as a consequence. is the fact that Foucault’s work “poses a direct challenge to the legitimacy of both traditional and oppositional intellectuals” (224). Bové takes the argument one step further. however. has been to demonstrate that “many of the ‘oppositional’ rhetorics are in complicity with the hegemony of power” (224). “Said is specifically defending the traditional and privileged role of the leading intellectual by making Foucault. arguing that . Valerie Kennedy. and so forth. There is a kind of quietism that emerges at various points in Foucault’s career: the sense that everything is historically determined. a crucial element in the tactics he deploys to empower his own position” (214). Said is. (Edward Said at the Limits 91–92) Paul Bové also finds that “in Said’s later work. he has not been in a position to sufficiently appreciate the critical importance this notion has with regard to the role of intellectuals. Foremost among these are the intellectuals and it therefore behooves them to realize the extent to which their activity and pronouncements fit into or resist a particular regime of truth. and Williams [. that ideas of justice.’ ” Bové argues. Foucault is a necessary adversary. its general politics of truth: that is. because they are constituted by whoever is using them. Foucault’s aims are indeed political because “in his genealogies Foucault is actually attacking both the belief in the revolutionary potential of these empowering discourses and the intellectual type they empower” (225). of good and evil. this “politics of truth” also serves to determine “le statut de ceux qui ont la charge de dire ce qui fonctionne comme vrai” ‘the status of those who are charged with saying what counts as true’ (3: 158). “Said has chosen to ignore Foucault’s figure of a ‘regime of truth. Moreover.K ARLIS R ACEVSKIS 89 to the controls of a disciplinary or carceral society. sa politique générale de la vérité: c’est-à-dire les types de discours qu’elle accueille et fait fonctionner comme vrais” ‘Each society has its regime of truth. Whereas the whole of Fanon’s work is based upon the notion of genuine historical change by which oppressed classes are capable of liberating themselves from their oppressors. Said’s implicit claims of moral superiority for his brand of “insurrectionary scholarship” appear remarkably devoid of a critical self-awareness. “Chaque société a son régime de vérité. have no innate significance. The noteworthy merit of Foucault. It is an ironic reversal noted by other critics as well. In Culture and Imperialism. a critic of that role. According to Foucault. by attempting to show that the contrast Said strives to establish between himself and Foucault may actually work to discredit Said’s position rather than Foucault’s. for example. As Bové points out. Bové suggests. . uncovers one such instance in Said’s stated preference for Fanon’s politics. What Said refuses to recognize at his peril. Seen in this light. (53–54) It has been suggested that Said needed to distance himself at this time from Foucault in order to reinforce and legitimize his own standing as critic. seem morally culpable for abandoning it” (225). That is why. Mustapha Marrouchi proposes that in moving away from Foucault.]. carving a niche for himself and thereby charting a course that would make him not only a leading critic of colonialism but also the champion of the counterdiscourse of theory that Foucault pioneered. for a reader familiar with Foucault’s work. de refus. Such an explanation tells little about Foucault or the importance of silence in his oeuvre. It seemed to me interesting to try to understand our society and our civilization through their systems of exclusion. Whence the poverty and masochism of Foucault’s theory. As Foucault explains: Il m’a paru intéressant d’essayer de comprendre notre société et notre civilisation à travers leurs systèmes d’exclusion. has been established only on the basis of such a silence’ (Dits et écrits 1: 160). native and Western. to expose itself. “Je n’ai pas voulu faire l’histoire de ce langage.90 RESEARCH IN AFRICAN LITER ATURES Fanon represents the interests of a double constituency. and in accordance with “the sadism of an always victorious logic” that Said takes to be the marking characteristic of Foucault’s disciplinary system.” Eventually. In the preface to his book on the history of madness. de processus. deeply eccentric. (278) It seems evident to Kennedy. to Said himself. de gens. . he concludes his discussion of Foucault by voicing both his disappointment and disbelief: “What puzzles me is not only how someone as remarkably brilliant as Foucault could have arrived at so impoverished and masochistically informed a vision of sound and silence. ce qu’elles doivent laisser sombrer dans l’oubli. plutôt l’archéologie de ce silence” ‘I have not tried to write the history of that language. that Said’s characterization of Foucault and what he supposedly represents “does apply. Foucault tells us. For Said. of rejection and refusal. His voice is both that of the ‘lonely individual scholar’ [. His disillusionment with the direction taken by Foucault’s investigations is doubtless genuine—as is his astonishment at the seemingly lasting effects of Foucault’s influence. leurs limites. but rather the archaeology of that silence’ (160). the two terms are meant to dramatize the interaction between the observer and the observed in a disciplinary society. Said cannot be accused of acting in bad faith or being cynical. In the first place. Foucault points out that the language of psychiatry. the somewhat clumsy mixed metaphor of “a vision of sound and silence” completely misses the point in regard to the role of silence in Foucault’s work. “silence and indeed resistance to disciplinary power are gradually eliminated” (522). through everything . but also how so many readers in Europe and the United States have routinely accepted it as anything more than an intensely private. to order itself before the watchful eye of a silent authoritarian observer. n’a pu r s’établir que sur un tel silence” ‘which is a monologue of reason about madness. de rejet. ironically enough. ignoring the imperial context of his own theories. Foucault seems actually to represent an irresistible colonizing movement that paradoxically fortifies the prestige of both the lonely individual scholar and the system that contains him. and insular version of history” (Reflections on Exile 523). In a somewhat poetic essay on the interrelationship of sound and silence. l’obligation dans laquelle elles sont de supprimer un certain nombre de choses. moving from confinement to liberation. At the same time. Silence could also be taken as a metaphor for everything about which Western civilization had preferred to keep silent over the ages. what may appear striking is the utter disaccord between Foucault’s own often expressed views of his project and Said’s characterization of it.] and that of someone positioned in a prestigious part of the Western academy” (110). Here again. à travers ce dont elles ne veulent pas. . “qui est monologue de la raison sur la folie. where “the silence of the delinquent behavior is made to speak. to a certain extent. As a result. for example. Thus. He is therefore puzzled as to why Foucault let himself be trapped in what looked like a theoretical dead end. he went on. their limits. de stratégies qui renversent la situation—. of everything they must allow to be submerged into forgetfulness. because if there were no possibility of resistance—of a violent resistence. of processes. the impending transformations. Quite possibly. there is necessarily a possibility of resistance. He therefore tries to come up with psychological explanar tions suggesting. “sont des relations mobiles. de ruse. that is. having written him off as a useful ally in his own critical undertaking.’ This is because. there would be no power relations at all’ (4: 720). could only exist “dans la mesure où les sujets sont libres” ‘to the extent that subjects are free. it is not difficult to find answers that address the major misgivings Said harbored about the evolution of Foucault’s project. to help resurrect discredited languages and forgotten knowledges.K ARLIS R ACEVSKIS 91 they do not want. “why he went as far as he did in imagining power to be so irresistible and unopposable” (Imagination of Power 123).5 Said tried to explain. (Dits et écrits 2: 184) Foucault’s purpose was surely not to “make silence disappear” but to give a voice to those who had been silenced and. more particularly perhaps because he felt that there was little he could do to affect it” (Reflections on Exile 194). qu’elles ne sont pas données une fois pour toutes” ‘these power relations are mobile relations. c’est-à-dire qu’elles peuvent se modifier. what for him was a puzzling turn to a concern with the self in Foucault’s last two volumes on the history of sexuality: “What caused this particular and overdetermined shift from the political to the personal was.” he pointed out. the precariousness. in the sense that he understood them. of flight. the obligation they feel to suppress a certain number of things. of strategies that invert the situation—. they may become modified. the effect of some disenchantment with the public sphere. of people. that Foucault’s decision to disengage from politics and his “pessimistic determinism” were attributable to his “disenchantment with both the insurrections of the 1960s and the Iranian Revolution” (Culture and Imperialism 278). car s’il n’y avait pas possibilité de résistance—de résistance violente. In any case. il n’y aurait pas du tout de relations de pouvoir” ‘in relations of power. of ruse. Said’s attempts at psychologizing all that he found incomprehensible in Foucault’s work indicates also that he was clearly not interested in evaluating it on its own terms—or even in light of the many explanations and clarifications Foucault offered about his critical procedure and purpose over the last years of his life. Foucault admits also that he has not always been able to express himself clearly . “dans les relations de pouvoir il y a forcément possibilité de résistence. that is. his interpretation of Foucault is fi xated on one theme: the disciplinary or carceral society in which the mechanisms of power are so entrenched that resistance becomes futile. de fuite. Foucault also found it important to explain that these relations of power. “Ces relations de pouvoir. among other things. perhaps. they are not given once and for all’ (4: 720). As can be seen from Said’s explanation. Said had simply stopped paying attention to what Foucault had to say. in response to a question about his alleged nihilism and determinism. He further explained that his studies were meant to bring out precisely the opposite. and the contingency of social structures rather than their necessity or immobility. Foucault responded that he was “ahuri de constater que des gens ont pu voir dans mes études historiques l’affirmation d’un déterminisme auquel on ne peut pas échapper” ‘astounded to learn that people could have seen the affirmation of an inescapable determinism in my historical studies’ (Dits et écrits 4: 693). in a similar manner. donc ce qui se cache le mieux” ‘[Paradoxically. it was important for Foucault to study the hidden part. of power/knowledge relations.’ Paradoxically. but a relation no one controls. en partie. a certain form of domination. in the context of these explanations. C’est-à-dire qu’il n’est pas vrai que la connaissance puisse fonctionner ou que l’on puisse découvrir la vérité. Contrary to what Said suggests repeatedly.” his objection is still formulated in terms of a traditional Cartesian/Kantian model of human agency (The World. The visible part of power was but a façade for Foucault. one could even say diametrically opposite. I would say that it is in the asylum that I became aware of a kind of problem that has not stopped haunting me ever since—it is the problem of power. Another aspect of power that Foucault stressed was its propensity for remaining hidden. Power. une certaine forme de domination. Equally beside the point is the remark that “Foucault takes a curiously passive and sterile view not so much of the uses of power. it is not true that knowledge can function or that truth. or mental illness. the part that was generally known as “la ‘vie politique’ depuis le 19e siècle” ‘political life since the nineteenth century. and held on to” (221). as I do. the Text. perspectives. reality. It is because. for Foucault. used. as he explained in a radio interview: Je dirais que c’est à partir de l’asile que m’est apparue une espèce de problème qui n’a pas cessé de me hanter. To understand the politics of the bourgeoisie in the way it dealt with such issues as delinquency. Foucault’s notion of power does not derive from the model of a carceral or disicplinary society: he first became aware of power/knowledge relations psychiatric hospital. abusing power relations. is that Said and Foucault approached the question of power from two different. qui est le problème du pouvoir. in part. une certaine forme d’assujettissement. For Said. thus what hides itself best’ (3: 263). la réalité. I constitute myself as a subject through a certain number of power relations that are exercised over me and that I exercise over others’ (4: 451). c’est que. is not a thing. What Foucault strives to understand and to bring to light are the impersonal. the play of strategies beneath the official political representations: “C’est en partant de ces techniques de pouvoir et en . (2: 790) This subjection is made possible then by the subject’s relation to truth—to the truth that determines its very being in society: “Si je dis vrai sur moi même comme je le fais. ideas. c’est ce qui se montre le plus. exploiting.] power in the West is what shows itself most. power is something someone possesses and there is always an intention or a will using. je me constitue comme sujet à travers un certain nombre de relations de pouvoir qui sont exercées sur moi et que j’exerce sur les autres” ‘If I say the truth about myself. l’objectivité des choses. a certain form of subjection. but of how and why power is gained. “le pouvoir en Occident. ambition. the sheer love of power. the objectivity of things can be discovered without the putting into play of a certain power. What becomes apparent. and the Critic 222). That is. It is not something to be gained or lost but an interplay of strategies in which a subject’s involvement is predicated on the position it occupies in the field of power and. sexuality. more specifically. sans mettre en jeu un certain pouvoir.92 RESEARCH IN AFRICAN LITER ATURES or unambiguously on the subject because he was trying to grasp something for which normal everyday language and concepts were simply inadequate. when Said points out that Foucault “surely underestimates such motive forces in history as profit. anonymous ways in which power networks function. Thus. “les relations stratégiques. des règles. This need to analyze such mechanisms from the bottom up. Said was thus able to appreciate a particular characteristic of Foucault’s mind and rationalize his methodology in terms of the overall thrust of his project. “his Eurocentrism was almost total. Politics. “was. Said goes on. Foucault showed no interest in either feminist or postcolonial issues and since his theoretical concerns . because it had helped provide the tools with which he himself had been able to problematize a notion such as the Orient. des institutions et des habitudes qui s’étaient sédimentées depuis des décennies et des décennies” ‘to make problematic and suspect evidences. however. This was an approach that Said was able to appreciate. discourses. Foucault turned increasingly to an approach he found most fruitful. his insouciance about the discrepancies between his basically limited French evidence and his ostensibly universal conclusions. and just like his theory of power. thus he eventually would distinguish three interrelated levels of analysis. and his Frenchness made him blind to the ethnically bound evidence of his research: “The most striking of his blind spots. In light of the foregoing considerations.’ Its purpose was to “rendre problématiques et douteuses des évidences. It was a distinction Said rejected out of hand. as it were. c’est à partir de là que l’on peut comprendre comment effectivement ces méchanismes finissent par faire partie de l’ensemble” ‘It is by starting with these techniques of power and by showing the economic profits or political utility deriving from them. it is also understandable why Foucault’s purpose was never to design political strategies for changing society or the world because he was always acutely aware of the dangers of designing programs for political action without really knowing what their effects might be.K ARLIS R ACEVSKIS 93 montrant les profits économiques ou les utilités politiques qui en dérivent. and states of domination’ (4: 728) in an interview given one month before his untimely death in 1984. which he termed “problématisation” ‘problematizing. and statements were really all about. As a result of this narrow focus. made Foucault’s intellectual and political assumptions so much different from his: he was French. rules. institutions.” Indeed. This refusal was very much in keeping with his understanding of the critic’s responsibilities and his preference for what he termed was the stance of the specific—as opposed to the universal—intellectual: the purpose being not to tell others what to do but to make knowledge available to them on the basis of which they could then decide on the best course of action. was only reaffirmed in later years.” Said tells us. in the final account. practices. without illusion” (Reflections on Exile 196). it is from there that it is possible to understand how indeed these mechanisms of power end up as part of the whole’ (3: 183). The categories were quite meaningful for Foucault. des pratiques. for example. At the same time. were constantly evolving and gaining in complexity as a result of the changing orientation in Foucault’s thinking and the new emphases in his research. techniques of government. epistemes. he was also forced to recognize an unbridgeable gap which. as if ‘history’ itself took place only among a group of French and German thinkers” (Reflections on Exile 196–97). calling it “a phony set of categories invented by Foucault” (Power. as Foucault’s theory of power grew ever more complex. and Culture 222). and habits that had been sedimenting for tens and tens of years’ (Dits et écrits 4: 688). it was perhaps because as a first discoverer of their enormously detailed power he wanted everyone to be aware of what disciplines. Thus in an essay he wrote commemorating Foucault’s passing he supposed that if this brilliant man “was less interested in how the rules could be changed. In the last two years of his life. les techniques de gouvernement et les états de domination” ‘strategic relations. rêvé comme le point vertigineux d’où naissent les nostalgies et les promesses de retour. never undertook to produce a theoretical corpus to be used in the service of feminist or postcolonial causes. ces lignes de contact entre le corps. offered to the West’s colonizing reason yet indefinitely inaccessible. encore qu’il doive y chercher ce qu’est sa vérité primitive. At the same time. le discours et le pouvoir politique” ‘the importance of the exercise of power. mais indéfi niment inaccessible. car il demeure toujours la limite: nuit du commencement. even though it still must try to fi nd its own primitive truth in it. that obsessed . The experience of living in these countries. while affecting him emotionally. “he didn’t understand the colonial dynamic at all. this has not prevented feminists or postcolonial critics from fi nding applications they deemed quite useful for their causes. especially in Poland and Tunisia. mais dans laquelle il a tracé une ligne de partage. he was not entirely blind to what was going on in the rest of the world. Though Foucault was French. and European. also made him realize “l’importance de l’exercice du pouvoir. en quoi l’Occident s’est formé. the Orient is everything for it that it is not.” Said is forced to conclude (Interviews 130). l’Orient offert à la raison colonisatrice de l’Occident. et la naissance d’un développement de type capitaliste avec tous les phénomènes d’exploitation et d’oppression économiques et politiques” ‘I discovered what the remainders of a capitalist colonization could be like. il y a ce partage qu’est l’Orient: l’Orient. there is a partition.” the insight evident in this passage is rather remarkable: it not only offers a definition of Orientalism—probably before Said thought of it. pensé comme l’origine. Here is what Foucault writes in 1960.6 The techniques of surveillance in Poland. la vie. (Dits et écrits 1: 161–62) For someone whose Eurocentrism was “total. of course. because it remains forever the limit: night of the beginning in which the West formed itself but in which it drew a dividing line. tout au long du devenir occidental” ‘Someone will have to write a history of this great divide. which is the Orient: the Orient. it suggests the project itself: “Il faudra faire une histoire de ce grand partage. instances of injustice and police brutality in Tunisia. Said’s rather rash pronouncements about Foucault’s blindness to his own limitations or nationalistic preconceptions are perhaps more noteworthy for revealing Said’s own self-imposed blindness to certain aspects of Foucault’s life and work. thought of as origin. In an interview given in 1975. while in Poland he had witnessed what oppression was like in a socialist country. the Orient. as well as the birth of a capitalistic type of development with all the characteristics of economic and political exploitation and oppression’ (“Confessions” 90). discourse. as it accompanies the West’s coming into being. he remembers that. In the early part of his career. In the universality of Western reason. these lines of contact between bodies. Poland. he had occasion to spend several years teaching in Sweden. and political power’ (90).94 RESEARCH IN AFRICAN LITER ATURES were equally limited. and Tunisia.’ Foucault proposes. Foucault says. Foucault. as he composes the preface to his book on the history of madness: Dans l’universalité de la ratio occidentale. whereas in Tunisia “j’ai découvert ce que pouvaient être les restes d’une colonisation capitaliste. These were events. life. had an important formative effect on his thinking about the subjects of his research. dreamt of as the vertiginous point from which are born nostalgias and promises of a return. l’Orient est pour lui tout ce qu’il n’est pas. Moreover. K ARLIS R ACEVSKIS 95 him. He evidently discovered a side of Foucault he had not really known.” the rest of the article is equally laudatory and perceptive. “même si je n’en ai tiré la leçon théorique que très tardivement. In a sense. like autobiographical fragments. In a few paragraphs. unsupported assertions” and “grand statements about society as a whole . I realized that I should have been speaking long ago of these problems of relations between power and the body—something I wound up doing in Discipline and punish’ (90). What Foucault shows in the numerous interviews he gave is a propensity for remaining constantly open to the experience of the world around him—a capacity for being moved by this experience but also for integrating it within the intellectual framework of his ongoing investigations. earlier. Said manages to capture the essential aspects of Foucault’s thought. sexuality’ (Dits et écrits 4: 747–48). Not only can one hear him elaborate on the continuity of his thought and its relationships with the Frankfurt School. One would be hard pressed to find a better way to characterize the moving force behind Foucault’s “relentless erudition. Gaston Bachelard and Georges Canguilhem (his main teacher. As he once pointed out. that “Foucault’s extraordinary blend of energy and pessimism gives a remarkable dignity to his work. in a sense. clarifying issues while discovering new problems in thought and life. which was a dignity of purpose and an ethical commitment to intellectual work—values they both clearly shared. Said did get an opportunity to immerse himself in these occasional reflections when he was asked to review volume three of the selections translated in English. In addition. when he points out. Said corrects some of his own.’ originally published in Italy around 1980. somewhat rash generalizations. Although belatedly. prison. Said rediscovers here what first attracted him to Foucault. the eminent French historian of science). la sexualité” ‘I have always wanted my books to be. en un sens. des fragments d’autobiographie. Mes livres ont toujours été mes problèmes personnels avec la folie. . finalement. Said concludes his last book by speaking of the desire “to grasp the difficulty of what cannot be grasped” (Humanism and Democratic Criticism 144). The four-volume compilation of Dits et écrits has therefore become an indispensable aid for reading his books. Freud. which is anything but an exercise in professorial abstraction” (17). evoke the “formidably ascetic work ethic” driving what Foucault himself termed his “relentless erudition. presented without evidence or proof. Je me suis aperçu que j’aurais dû parler depuis longtemps de ces problèmes de rapport entre le pouvoir et le corps à quoi j’ai abouti. Marx. as he explains: What I found especially valuable in the collection were the unexpected pleasures of essays like ‘Lives of Infamous Men’ and a magnificent long discussion. My books have always been my personal problems with madness. (17) While Said also expresses reservations about Foucault’s “maddening. but we are also given a rare opportunity to see how a great and original mind produces its work as well as itself at the same time. for example. dans Surveiller et punir” ‘even though I drew a theoretical lesson from them rather belatedly.” .” and effectively summarize his most important contributions to contemporary critical thinking. ‘Interview with Michel Foucault. “j’ai toujours tenu à ce que mes livres soient. . inseparable from his life. la prison. His books were. in a real sense. ” The New York Times Book Review 17 Dec. Edward Said: A Critical Introduction. Geoffrey Hartman. Said. He expressed the hope that this tragedy would help initiate a critical thinking process on both sides that would somehow escape their respective ideological bounds since the leaders of either side. Begin or Arafat. “Deconstructing the System. 1994. Frank Kermode. at one time. in particular.96 RESEARCH IN AFRICAN LITER ATURES NOT ES 1. The two articles in question were “Abecedarium culturae: Structuralism.” Criticism in Society: Interviews with Jacques Derrida. whose title of a book he published in 1927 quickly became this proverbial expression of disappointment with the role and responsibility of intellectuals. Reflexive Waters. 1975. 1997. Bart. The interview was given to the philosopher Roger-Pol Droit who has only now decided to publish it. Foucault. Edward Said at the Limits. is also someone whom Said admired for his uncompromising critical stance. London: Methuen. for example. J. . 1994. Mustapha. Hillis Miller. A. Storytellers. Postcolonial Theory: Contexts.” Triquarterly 20 (1971): 33–71. New York: Basic Books. Bové. Politics. 5. could hardly be trusted (Dits et écrits 4: 349). Dits et écrits. . . Intellectuals in Power: A Genealogy of Critical Humanism. “Les confessions de Michel Foucault. Frank Lentricchia. and Fons Elders. Foucault’s views on the conflict between Israel and Palestine were certainly not as one sided as this anecdote would suggest. 1987. Signifying with a Vengeance: Theories. 6. . Absence. “Edward Said. Michel. Albany: SUNY P. Cambridge: Polity.” Le Point 1 July 2004: 82–93. i. . Literatures. London: Souvenir. Julien Benda. Imre Salusinszky. 4. Edward W. Marrouchi. New York: Vintage. Harold Bloom. 1986. Kennedy. Albany: SUNY P. Practices. Absence. Beginnings. 1974. WOR K S CIT ED Ayer. It should be noted that the events of 1968 had little effect on Foucault because he was in Tunisia at the time. 2. Said is referring to the events of 1968. London: Verso. Paris: Gallimard. In an interview he gave in 1982. 2000. . 2002. 279–343 in Beginnings). 123–48. He talks about these in his interview published recently in Le Point. Paul A. he condemned the massacre of Palestinians in the camps of Sabra and Chatila by Israeli forces. The transcript of the debate was published as Reflexive Water. Edward Said. Writing. hold out hope for a bright future for Iran under Khomeni’s leadership. 2004 . Ed. “Abecedarium culturae: Structuralism. Discourse. Valerie. and J. Barbara Johnson. Writing Statement. Moore-Gilbert. Structuralism” (pp.” which became the chapter entitled “Abecedarium culturae: Absence. Northrop Frye. New York: Columbia UP. 4 vols. Culture and Imperialism. New York. and to the fact that Foucault did. Writing” and “Michel Foucault as an Intellectual Imagination. 2000: 16–17. on the twentieth anniversary of Foucault’s death.. Archaeology. 3. The phrase does occasionally appear under Said’s pen.e. . Cambridge: Harvard UP. 149–55. Reflections on Exile and Other Essays. New York: Vintage.” Raritan 4. 1983. 2000.2 (1984): 1–11. . . Penguin. Ieme van der Poel and Sophie Bertho. the Text. Gauri Viswanathan. Ed. “Michel Foucault. and the Critic: Interview with Gary Hentzi and Anne McClintock. “The Franco-American Dialogue: A Late-Twentieth-Century Assessment. “Foucault and the Imagination of Power. Teaneck: Farleigh Dickinson UP. the Text. 1978. 1999. “Overlapping Territories: The World. and the Critic. Orientalism.” Traveling Theory: France and the United States. 2004. Ed. Cambridge: Harvard UP. . Humanism and Democratic Criticism. Ed. Power. 1986. Amritjit Singh and Bruce G. 1991. . Critical Text (1986): 53–68. “Michel Foucault as an Intellectual Imagination. Ed. .” Boundary 2. . Johnson. New York: Pantheon. . 2001. 2004. and Culture: Interviews with Edward W. Politics.” Critical Inquiry 4 (1978): 673–714. Columbia UP. . The World. Jackson: UP of Mississippi. Reflections on Exile. 1927–1984: In Memoriam. .” Foucault: A Critical Reader. Interviews with Edward Said. 239–45. 134–56.K ARLIS R ACEVSKIS 97 . “The Problem of Textuality: Two Exemplary Solutions. 2000. . Said. Cambridge: Harvard UP. David Couzens Hoy.1 (1972): 1–36. 187–97. Oxford: Blackwell. Reflections on Exile. .