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Brief Lives

Michel Foucault (1926-84)

Roy Williams analyses a notorious yet influential post-modern philosophe.

Paul-Michel Foucault was born in Poitiers, France, on October 15th, 1926, to an upper-middle-class bourgeoise family. He excelled in his education yet rejected much of his upbringing. Foucault’s work as a philosopher and historian of ideas radically influenced the historical method as well as many other fields apart from philosophy. The influence that Foucault had upon literature, philosophy, history, and psychology, was groundbreaking, and caused many interdisciplinary changes. While Foucault did not abide labels regarding his philosophy, his work was instrumental in influencing post-modernism and post-structuralism.

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