ABSTRACT
French philosopher Michel Foucault is among the most influential thinkers of the twentieth century. This chapter discusses the general concern and intent of Foucault's work. It considers his methodology and his concept of discourse. The chapter explains his analytics of power. In the guise of a conclusion, the chapter points to his legacy and current developments. Foucault owes the extraordinary impact of his work to his impressive material analyses and conceptual innovations. His research examined the history of accounting for the reasonable subject through the separation of sanity from insanity, of the healthy human body, of the emerging importance of the modern subject in the humanities, of illegal action, discipline and punishment, and of 'normal vs. abnormal' sexuality. Foucault established a huge range of now-famous analytic and diagnostic concepts, including discourse, dispositive, power/knowledge, archaeology, genealogy, discipline, biopower, governmentality and many others.
