The Development And Construction Of Foucault’s New Subject

The construction of the new subject is one of the most important aspects in Foucault ’s late thought,However,the academia has insufficient attention to this aspect.Foucault ’s early thought is mainly focused on the criticism of social thought while Foucault ’s late thought devotes to the construction of the new subject and tries to seek a new development for the society and human beings.Only clarifying the difference and context between Foucault’s early and late thought,can we comprehensively grasp the context,direction and value of Foucault’s thought.Foucault’s early thought is mainly focused on human’s dilemma in realistic social,criticizing the subject that is suppressed by knowledge and disciplined by the power.On this basis,Foucault ’s late thought based on the construction of the new subject,tries to seek a redemption for modern people.According to Foucault,the new subject is a kind of form and relationship,rather than an entity.Therefore,the interpretation of the construction of the new subject in Foucault ’s thought is that how to implement the historic construction of the new subject of different forms in the real society which is full of power and knowledge.There are three main aspects mentioned in the construction of the new subject in Foucault ’s thought.The first one is to improve the relationship between the self and self through “paying attention to yourself”;Secondly,it pays attention to deal with the relationship between people,people and the groups or society,and seeks the appropriate way to get along with the others;Thirdly,the two aspects mentioned above are reflected in the aesthetic practice of the pursuit of artistic existence.These three aspects are correlative and supplementing in the relationship of self concerns and others and they permeated in the aesthetic practice.The construction of the new subject in Foucault ’s thought indicates that hehas had the expectation to the development of future society and people in his late life.On the other hand,Foucault’s construction of the new subject has not been fully developed and it’s incomplete and non-universal to a certain extent due to Foucault ’s early death as well as the limitation of the time.