Foucault: The Archaeology of knowledge
Part 1, Part 2
The word “Archeology” originates from Greek word “arkhaiologia”, the combination of “arkhaio” (ancient) and “logia” (logics, studies). So “Archeology” refers to the study of ancient things (see wiktionary: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/archaeology ).
It is very interesting that Foucault use “archeology” in his book to express the actually opposite meaning. His “archeology ” is different from the traditional meaning or our common understanding on “archeology”: the traditional archeology is one of the branches of history, while Foucault’s “archeology”, to my understanding, is “anti-history”. If the key point of traditional archeology is “continuity” or “linearity” in time, then Foucault’s emphasis on his archeology is “discontinuity” or “non-linearity”. According to Foucault, traditional form of history is to “memorize the monuments of the past, transform them into documents and lend speech to those traces which, in themselves, are not verbal…(p7)” , however, “in our time, history is that which transforms documents into monuments(p7),” in other words, “history is trying to define within the documentary material itself unities, totalities, series, relations. (p7)” However, Foucault’s archeology refuses or I may say is trying to challenge these concepts of history. He contends that those “pre-existing forms of continuity, all syntheses that are accepted without question, must remain in suspense (p 25)”, because the current knowledge, disciplines or culture that we have accepted with no doubt or thought to be proper are just the product of certain historical periods, which might be soon /“in foreseeable future ”out of use (p26).
Foucault even poses more penetrating questions to the existence of all the knowledge emerged in human history. “What are they? How can they be defined or limited? What distinct types of laws can they obey? What articulation are they capable of ? what specific phenomena do they reveal in the field of discourse? (p 26).”He is pretty sure the risks and danger of doing this, like he said in chapter 2: “instead of providing a basis for what already exists, instead of going over with bold strokes lines that have already been sketched, ...one is forced to advance beyond familiar territory, far from the certainties to which one is accustomed, towards an as yet uncharted land and unforeseeable conclusion...(p39)”.
Foucault also stresses the importance of freedom that should be granted to “discourse”, which according to him, is the not just the simple combination of letters or words, and which should not be circumscribed by some regulations or meanings of languages. “Discourse” is the medium that connects people and the world, and the relation between people and the world can also be described as a relation of discourse (p45). There is nothing or no knowledge can exist independently from discourse and “discourse” in Foucault’s discussion, is not just historically pluralistic but synchronically pluralistic as well.
No comments:
Post a Comment