Feminism, Foucault, and Embodied Subjectivity

Margaret A. McLaren

• Publisher: SUNY Press
• Year: 2012
• ISBN:
  9780791487938
• Topic: Philosophy
• Subtopic: Political Philosophy

Addressing central questions in the debate about Foucault's usefulness for politics, including his rejection of universal norms, his conception of power and power-knowledge, his seemingly contradictory position on subjectivity and his resistance to using identity as a political category, McLaren argues that Foucault employs a conception of embodied subjectivity that is well-suited for feminism. She applies Foucault's notion of practices of the self to contemporary feminist practices, such as consciousness-raising and autobiography, and concludes that the connection between self-transformation and social transformation that Foucault theorizes as the connection between subjectivity and institutional and social norms is crucial for contemporary feminist theory and politics.

Table of contents

• FEMINISM, FOUCAULT, AND EMBODIED SUBJECTIVITY
• CONTENTS
• ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
• 1. THE FEMINISM AND FOUCAULT DEBATE: STAKES, ISSUES, POSITIONS
• 2. FOUCAULT, FEMINISM, AND NORMS
• 3. FOUCAULT AND THE SUBJECT OF FEMINISM
• 4. FOUCAULT AND THE BODY: A FEMINIST REAPPRAISAL
• 5. IDENTITY POLITICS: SEX, GENDER, AND SEXUALITY
• 6. PRACTICES OF THE SELF: FROM SELF-TRANSFORMATION TO SOCIAL TRANSFORMATION
• CONCLUSION
• NOTES
• BIBLIOGRAPHY
• INDEX