archéologie
Foucault's 1960s method: reconstruct, from texts, the rules governing what can be said in a given period, and mark the breaks between periods, without seeking origins or causes.
The historian as archaeologist, digging not through soil but through layers of words, papers and sources.
The image Shore uses for it, in our paraphrase.
In lecture order, as Marci Shore presents each view. The time opens that minute of the lecture on YouTube.
Discourse must be treated as discontinuous: the historian excavates layers of talk and marks the moments where the way something is spoken about shifts.
Put simply Foucault: a history of how people talk must look for breaks. The historian digs through layers of talk and marks the moments when the way something is spoken about changes.
Nietzsche's genealogy is the inspiration for Foucault's archaeology: a history that looks for discontinuity.
Put simply Foucault's method, which he calls "archaeology," is a history that looks for breaks. Its inspiration is Nietzsche's "genealogy."
The historian is an archaeologist digging in words and sources rather than earth; archaeology seeks no secret of origins, only "the systematic description of a discourse object."
Put simply Foucault: the historian is an archaeologist who digs in words and documents instead of soil. The aim is not the secret of origins, only a systematic description of how something was talked about.
When the discourse shifts, the archaeologist does not ask why. Causality is not the point; the task is to describe the break.
Put simply Foucault: when the way people talk shifts, the historian does not ask why. Causes are not the point; the job is to describe the break.
Shore's verdict: far more than Derrida, Foucault stays productive rather than merely deconstructive, giving historians a method that has yielded much good history.
Put simply Shore's verdict: Foucault, far more than Derrida, builds rather than just takes apart. He gave historians a method that has produced a lot of good history.
Links from these claims to others in the course. Each shows the earlier claim, then the later one that answers it. “Our inference” marks a link Shore does not state outright.
FoucaultDiscourse must be treated as discontinuous: the historian excavates layers of talk and marks the moments where the way something is spoken about shifts. L21 · 43:13
ShoreShore's example of a Foucauldian discontinuity: the moment Czech and Slovak Marxist believers begin setting Stalinist words against others, class consciousness against individual conscience, the people against persons. L21 · 44:54
Shore offers the Czech and Slovak writers' shift in vocabulary as an example of what Foucault would call a moment of discontinuity.
Throughlines that pass through one of these claims.
Terms that appear in the same claims.