Jean-Michel Landry (2020) Foucault on Christianity: The Impasse of Subjectivation, Political Theology, Published online: 30 Dec 2020
DOI: 10.1080/1462317X.2020.1866810
ABSTRACT
The last volume of Foucault’s History of Sexuality, Confessions of the Flesh, offers a detailed excursion into Early Christianity and its distinct mode of subjectivation. But it also discloses a paradox that was already apparent in some of Foucault’s published interventions: that his studies of Christian (and Ancient) ascetic practices contribute to foreclosing the analytical terrain that the notion of “subjectivation” opened up. The following remarks aim to show how, in turning to Christianity, Foucault leads the promising concept of subjectivation into a philosophical impasse.
KEYWORDS:
Subject formation, Sexuality, Religion, Ancient Philosophy, Subjection, Confession, Michel Foucault
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