Summary
Michael Foucault: Technologies of the Self
Writings on Late Antiquity and Early Christianity
"It seems to me, according to some suggestions of Jurgen Habermas, that three main types of techniques can be distinguished: techniques that allow someone to produce, transform, manipulate things; techniques that allow someone to use a system of signs and, finally, techniques that allow someone to determine the behavior of individuals, to impose certain goals and purposes. In short: However, over time I became increasingly aware that there is another type of techniques in all societies: these are techniques that allow individuals to perform a certain number of operations on their own bodies, souls, on their own behavior in order to transform and change themselves and thus reach a certain state of perfection, happiness, purity, supernatural power. Let's call these techniques "technologies of self". If you want to analyze the genealogy of the subject in Western civilization, then you have to take into account not only the techniques of domination but also the techniques of the self."
Michel Foucault
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