Essay review: Michel Foucault, An historian of the sciences humaines

✍ Scribed by David E. Leary

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1976
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 681 KB
• Volume: 12
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0022-5061
• DOI: 10.1002/1520-6696(197607)12:3<286::aid-jhbs2300120309>3.0.co;2-h

✦ Synopsis

Until recently Michel Foucault's reputation in the United States was limited, by and large, to the fact that he is the author of an ingenious (some would say maddening) history of "folly" in the Age of Reason. But in his homeland, France, he is well known as the author of over a dozen books, a leader of the radical academicians, one of the leading philosophers in the country, and the heir-apparent of Monsieur J. P. Sartre. I n a word, he is a cultural phenomenon of rather great magnitude.

Foucault is not an ordinary man. His interests, his talents, his commitments, and his accomplishments are highly