ITAL 6250

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  • Course Catalog - September 10, 2024 9:19AM EDT
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ITAL 6250
Introduction to Biopolitics

Course information provided by the Courses of Study 2023-2024.

The COVID-19 pandemic has reminded us of the relation between biological and the political, power and resistance, and life and death.  Fifty years ago, the philosopher Michel Foucault offered two terms to describe it: biopolitics and biopower.  In this introduction to both, we take up Foucault's writings on biopolitics in a series of interdisciplinary contexts, including but not limited to the philosophical, anthropological, and political.  In addition to Foucault, w will be reading elaborations on what has been called "the biopolitical paradigm" from writers as diverse as Agamben, Arendt, Arif, Biehl, Butler, Esposito, Fassin, Mbembe, and Sloterdijk.  Questions to be asked include how to describe relation between biopolitics and racism and in what ways has the pandemic altered our understanding of biopolitics.

When Offered Spring.

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Syllabi: none

  •   Regular Academic Session.  Combined with: ANTHR 4450, ANTHR 7450, ITAL 4250

  • 3 Credits Opt NoAud

  • 17097 ITAL 6250   SEM 101

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