Features
- Cover Type: Paperback with 240 pages
- Published by: Vintage March 29, 1994
- Written in: English
- ISBN 10 Number: 0679753346
- ISBN 13 Number: 978-0679753346
-
Book Dimensions:
7.9 x 5.1 x 0.7 inches
- Weighs: 9.6 ounces
Product Review
Learned [and] rewardingThe Birth of the Clinic continues [Foucault's] brilliant history, not of ideas as such, but of the of perception." -- The
New York Times Book Review
"The Birth of the Clinic attempts a minor revolution in medical-history writing. Foucault's research is overwhelming and affords the reader considerable entertainment as well as insight." --
Review
Product Review
Learned [and] rewardingThe Birth of the Clinic continues [Foucault's] brilliant history, not of ideas as such, but of the of perception." -- The
New York Times Book Review
"The Birth of the Clinic attempts a minor revolution in medical-history writing. Foucault's research is overwhelming and affords the reader considerable entertainment as well as insight."
Reader ReviewsIn 1963 M. Foucault published The Birth of the Clinic: An Archaeology of Medical Perception. Passing on into the medical gaze from the "unreasoned" being "unhealthy", the topic is one more time - health. The Birth of the Clinic is an elucidation of M. Foucault's immense research pursuing his "archaeology," searching for archival material in the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris. In this work M. Foucault shows us how at the start of the 19th century yet more discontinuity occurred. In the Classical Period we see the eruption of the practice of clinical medicine. The goal beforehand, according to M. Foucault had been to get rid of distress and to restore well-being. In the Classical Period, the diseased body itself became the central point of medical gaze, here we see a momentous shift in medicine. The common sense notion of "health" was uprooted with the aim of mending the patient to a condition of "normalcy". In The Birth of the Clinic, we see the discipline of medicine grow and change into a science, and within this backdrop we see medicine tied together with sciences such as anatomy, physiology, chemistry, and biology. Taking its place with the institutions in society brings medicine into a place that associates it with other political and social institutions. The concept of "normality" has political and social implications. If you are ill, de facto you are not "normal". M. Foucault makes the link here with other works such as Madness and Civilization, where madness ran counter to the socially agreeable idea of what was normal which put one in at the mercy of the asylum. Similarly, in the realm of medicine the clinic evolves. Within this framework, M. Foucault performs, once again, his archeology to explore the ever shifting power relations that occur with one more knowledge. The premise for all these shifts come full circle in The Order of Things were he examines how these Epistemes and discourse became a foundational consideration. If M. Foucault was worried about being labeled a Structuralist - this book is proof positive that he may not have ended as a Structuralist but he certainly started as one. After that almost threateningly short introduction (threatening in the sense that I run the risk of oversimplifying M. Foucault's project) I wish to conclude with a few more thoughts. What I see M. Foucault doing in this book, is to identify various texts that he uses to explore methods, laws, institutions, buildings and the philosophy of medicine - as the mutation of discourse - which is representative of the Episteme. In reality, M. Foucault is not really writing about medicine as he is about epistemology. Medical perception is also rather ontological - since I see M. Foucault making a (albeit a thin) link in the modern age of death and the individual. In the end, M. Foucault's importance is that he has boldly (in the tradition of Nietzsche) attempted to create a new method (despite denying it later) and a new framework for the study of the human sciences as a whole - for that one has to read The Order of Things (also available on Amazon.com). Be prepared for a brain twister. Miguel Llora
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