Review of Lynne Huffer, Mad for Foucault: Rethinking the Foundations of Queer Theory. New York: Columbia University Press, 2010 (original) (raw)

Mad for Foucault: Rethinking the Foundations of Queer Theory

2009

Preface: Why We Need Madness Acknowledgments Introduction: Mad for Foucault 1. How We Became Queer First Interlude: Nietzsche's Dreadful Attendant 2. Queer Moralities Second Interlude: Wet Dreams 3. Unraveling the Queer Psyche Third Interlude: Of Meteors and Madness 4. A Queer Nephew Fourth Interlude: A Shameful Lyricism 5. A Political Ethic of Eros Postlude: A Fool's Laughter Notes Works Cited Index

Foucault Studies Special Issue: Foucault and Feminism, September 2013

Foucault Studies

Michel Foucault died nearly thirty years ago, in 1984. He enjoyed widespread intellectual celebrity in France, and, towards the end of his life, in the United States, but his influence on the emerging field of feminist studies was minimal until well after his death. This is noteworthy only because of his overt queerness and engagement with radical politics during his life; Foucault quickly became the most influential twentieth century commentator on the politics of sexuality, yet his grasp of feminist politics seems tenuous, and his overt pronouncements, as well as the tacit implications of his writing, have long been labelled sexist. On the other hand, there is by now an enormous literature that takes up the implications of his work for feminism, without worrying too much about whether Foucault would have approved. The field has matured, in other words, and still has potential: the relatively long delay between Foucault's death and the publication of his lectures (and various ephemeral essays, speeches, and interviews) as well as the even longer interval in getting all this work translated into English means that the reception of his ideas in 2013 still feels ongoing, open to debate, and unresolved.