Situation, Meaning, and Improvisation: An Aesthetics of Existence in Dewey and Foucault

Authors

  • Vincent Colapietro Pennsylvania State University

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.22439/fs.v0i11.3203

Abstract

This essay explores important intersections between the thought of John Dewey and Michel Foucault, with special attention to the distinction between emancipation versus “practices of freedom.” The complex relationship between these thinkers is, at once, complementary, divergent, and overlapping. The author however stresses the way in which both Dewey and Foucault portray situated subjects as improvisational actors implicated in unique situations, the meaning of which turns on the extemporaneous exertions of these implicated agents.

Author Biography

Vincent Colapietro, Pennsylvania State University

Vincent Colapietro is Liberal Arts Research Professor in the Department of Philosophy at Pennsylvania State University (University Park Campus). In addition to numerous articles on Peirce and more generally pragmatism, he is the author of “The Vanishing Subject of Contemporary Philosophy” (Journal of Philosophy), “American Evasions of Foucault” (Southern Journal of Philosophy), and other essays exploring significant connections between classical American pragmatism and contemporary Continental thought. His books include Peirce’s Approach to the Self (1989) and Fateful Shapes of Human Freedom (2003).

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Published

2011-02-01

How to Cite

Colapietro, V. (2011). Situation, Meaning, and Improvisation: An Aesthetics of Existence in Dewey and Foucault. Foucault Studies, (11), 20–40. https://doi.org/10.22439/fs.v0i11.3203

Issue

Number 11: February 2011: Foucault and Pragmatism

Section

Special Issue on Foucault and Pragmatism

License

Authors retain copyright to their work, but assign the right of the first publication to Foucault Studies. The work is subject to a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 license, but despite these restrictions, authors can take for granted that Foucault Studies will permit articles published in Foucault Studies to be translated or reprinted in another format such as a book providing a full reference is made to Foucault Studies as the original place of publication.