A RECONSIDERATION OF FOUCAULT’S “MARXISM” IN RELATION TO THE THOUGHT OF LOUIS ALTHUSSER Cover Image
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A RECONSIDERATION OF FOUCAULT’S “MARXISM” IN RELATION TO THE THOUGHT OF LOUIS ALTHUSSER
A RECONSIDERATION OF FOUCAULT’S “MARXISM” IN RELATION TO THE THOUGHT OF LOUIS ALTHUSSER

Author(s): Deb J. Hill
Subject(s): Structuralism and Post-Structuralism, Marxism, Studies in violence and power
Published by: Addleton Academic Publishers
Keywords: Michel Foucault; Louis Althusser; Marxism; anti-humanism

Summary/Abstract: The purpose of this paper is to supplement existing studies that have explored Foucault’s “Marxist” inclinations by means of a focused consideration of the thought of the person who challenged Foucault with an entirely different version of Marxism – his friend and mentor, Louis Althusser. My argument here is that “Marxism” has been treated largely as a singular category within the literature, meaning that an understanding of the points of difference and agreement Foucault had with competing versions of Marxism has been conveniently ignored. As I maintain within this paper, one cannot fully understand the nature of Foucault’s relationship with “the Marxist tradition” – and his comments about various aspects of this tradition – without understanding Althusser’s own “rereading” of what could be regarded as dubious versions of Marxism. As I further contend, Foucault’s recalcitrant attitude towards traditional orthodoxies of scholarship and method owes much to Althusser’s articulation of Marx’s anti-humanist, anti-historical, and anti-Hegelian revolution in thought and practice.

  • Issue Year: 1/2013
  • Issue No: 02
  • Page Range: 208-229
  • Page Count: 22
  • Language: English