Celebrating Michel Foucault’s Birth Anniversary with Some Lesser Known Facts

After graduating in 1952, Foucault served as a cultural diplomat abroad for several years. He returned to France and published his first major book, The History of Madness in 1961. While working at the University of Clemont-Ferrand, he published his second book The Birth of the Clinic (1963) and The Order of Things (1966). These three works exemplified a historiographical technique which Foucault called his version of ‘archaeology’.

Between 1966 to 1968, Foucault lectured at the University of Tunis before returning to France, where he was appointed as head of the department of philosophy. He went to publish The Archaeology of Knowledge (1969). In 1970, Foucault was admitted to the prestigious College de France, the only one job he retained until his death. He later published Discipline and Punish (1975) and the controversial The History of Sexuality (1976), it was this work in which he developed archaeological and genealogical methods which emphasized the role that power plays in society.