Sexuality: The 1964 Clermont-Ferrand and 1969 Vincennes Lectures by Michel Foucault

Abstract

Reviewed by: Sexuality: The 1964 Clermont-Ferrand and 1969 Vincennes Lectures by Michel Foucault Mathew Rickard Sexuality: The 1964 Clermont-Ferrand and 1969 Vincennes Lectures. By Michel Foucault. Ed. by Claude-Olivier Doron, François Ewald, and Bernard E. Harcourt. Trans. by Graham Burchell. (Foucault's Early Lectures and Manuscripts) New York: Columbia University Press. 2021. 1+383 pp. $28; £22. ISBN 978–0–231–19507–2. The impact of Michel Foucault's work on sexuality cannot be overstated within the humanities and social sciences. Often considered to be one of the most cited scholars on the matter, Leo Bersani once described him as 'our most brilliant philosopher of power' whose 'importance can hardly be exaggerated' ('Michel Foucault: Philosopher of Power', Washington Post, 15 March 1981). Bersani was writing at the beginning of what would come to be known as the AIDS epidemic, during which sexuality would become heavily policed. In 2022, with culture wars targeting queer and transgender people, people of colour, and women, we have recourse to Foucault's thinking more than ever. This newly published translation of courses Foucault taught at the University of Clermont-Ferrand in 1964 and the experimental university centre in Vincennes in 1969 reveals the archaeology of what would become established Foucauldian thought. This volume traces Foucault's academic interest in sexuality from his focus on the epistemological origins of sexuality as a scientific discipline in his lectures at Clermont-Ferrand to the ideological turn he took at Vincennes, undoubtedly informed by the events of May 1968, which served as an intellectual revolution in France at the time. As such, while the focus of the book is sexuality, it also provides [End Page 248] an invaluable insight into the development of academic enquiry in mid-twentieth-century France. Given the book's origins as lecture notes, it can at times be dense and scientific. However, it has been expertly edited and extensively annotated, with prefaces written by Bernard E. Harcourt and François Ewald, and translation and editing notes provided by both Claude-Olivier Doron and Graham Burchell. The lectures are followed by interpretative discussions by Doron. An unexpected value can thus be found in this surrounding paratext. As Harcourt reflects, 'the notes are so rich and provide a remarkable bibliography, references, and historical links to many of Foucault's and his contemporaries' related writings. The notes alone are worth the price of admission, in addition to the brilliant course contexts which mine Foucault's unpublished notebooks' ('A Preface to Philosophical Praxis', pp. xi–xxxix (p. xxxiii)). The lectures begin in 1964 and seek to understand the construction of sexuality, especially in relation to so-called perversions. While Foucault had taught psychology from 1960, these lectures were given in the philosophy department, and as such present us with an insight into Foucault's unique blend of the two. The lectures take us through an introduction to the understanding of sexuality as a line of enquiry, which Foucault asserts is 'one of the characteristics of Western civilization' (p. 4). This is followed by discussions of the scientific knowledge of sexuality, sexual behaviour, sexual perversions, and infantile sexuality. Foucault's course on the discourse of sexuality in 1969, however, marks an ideological turn and a focus on how 'sexuality in its mechanisms and meanings is not just confined to sexual practices but extends very much further into behavior apparently very distant from it' (p. 4). These lectures look to history, literature, and law to understand sexuality more broadly. Beginning with an introduction to the discursive study of sexuality that will follow, they map the changes in our understanding of sexuality from the Enlightenment until the present day. This volume will be of interest to all scholars working on sexuality across many disciplines, particularly those whose study is informed by Foucauldian analyses of power, knowledge, and desire. By publishing and translating these early lectures, the editors have expanded our knowledge and appreciation of Foucault as a philosopher but have also contributed to continuing debates on the nature of human sexuality, which, as Harcourt notes, 'in the end, is basically written in sand' (p. xxxiii). Mathew...