Article

Name: «Courage of truth» and «care of the self» Foucault (objection Lorenzo Bernini)

Authors: Yu. A. Asoyan

Russian State Humanity University

Abstract: The paper addresses the meanings of the notion parrhesia (the courage of truth), as well as how it is related to the concept epimeleia heautou, or care of the self explored in Paul-Michel Foucault’s final course lectured by him in the Collège de France in 1981-1984. The author refers to the interpretation of Foucault’s views by the contemporary scholar from Verona. According to Bernini’s interpretation, Foucault’s interest in parrhesia was caused by his disappointment in the ethics of the care of the self. As Lorenzo Bernini says: In The Hermeneutics of the Subject Foucault had to admit, in spite of himself, that in the Hellenistic Age and in the Roman Imperial period the “culture of the self” froze into a universal normative morality that disclosed the Christian hermeneutic of desire and thus modern subjectivity. In the lectures at the Collège de France of the following years, he sought after the origins of an alternative tradition to which, he supposed, both the Enlightenment and his own critical attitude belonged; and he found it not in cura sui but in parrhesìa. In this way, Foucault abandoned the hypothesis that different historical systems of thought are incommensurable, and he ascertained that from the beginning – at least in the Western tradition – subjectivity is compelled to make a choice between an epistemic and an ethical approach to truth, between the will to knowledge and the will to freedom. In so doing, he opened a new field of research, which this conference contributes to promote and develop further. Although, one cannot discover any substantiation for this interpretation in the Foucault’s texts. The care of the self and courage of truth emerge not as alternatives in his works but rather tightly intertwined notions and interdependent strategies for building up subjectivity. The two different ways for the care of the self problem statement in Alcibiades I and Laches (what L. Bernini pointed out) do not indicate at the alternative of the care of the self and courage of truth. Quite the opposite, M. Foucault attempts to show that in the Laches where the primary concern for the care of the self is bios, parrhesia is immediately involved: bios acts both as the subject of the care of the self and continuous topic of Socrates’ parrheisiastic speech. Namely, this sphere (life style, how we conduct our lives, care of the self) makes the primary space for parrheisiastic practices, intelligible in its ethic per se and political meaning. Paul-Michel Foucalt stresses that he is interested not so much in the political as, peculiarly, in ethic parrhesia, which attracts him as the space and practice for constituting oneself and genuine care of the self.

Keywords: the courage of truth, parrhesia, care of the self, the formation of subjectivity, allergicheskie act, M. Foucault, L. Bernini, a method, genealogy

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