The Order of Things: An Archaeology of the Human Sciences is a book by French philosopher Michel Foucault. It proposes that every historical period has underlying epistemic assumptions, ways of thinking, which determine what is truth and what is acceptable discourse about a subject, by delineating the origins of biology, economics, and linguistics. The introduction to the origins of the human sciences begins with detailed, forensic analyses and discussion of the complex networks of sightlines, hidden-ness, and representation that exist in the group painting Las Meninas by Diego Velázquez. Foucault's application of the analyses shows the structural parallels in the similar developments in perception that occurred in researchers' ways of seeing the subject in the human sciences.
Cover of the French edition
Las Meninas (The Ladies-in-waiting, 1656), by Diego Velázquez. (Museo del Prado, Madrid)
Paul-Michel Foucault was a French philosopher, historian of ideas, writer, political activist, and literary critic. Foucault's theories primarily address the relationships between power and knowledge, and how they are used as a form of social control through societal institutions. Though often cited as a structuralist and postmodernist, Foucault rejected these labels. His thought has influenced academics, especially those working in communication studies, anthropology, psychology, sociology, criminology, cultural studies, literary theory, feminism, Marxism and critical theory.
Foucault in 1974
In the early 1950s, Foucault came under the influence of German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, who remained a core influence on his work throughout his life.
Foucault adored the work of Raymond Roussel and wrote a literary study of it.
Graves of Michel Foucault, his mother (right) and his father (left) in Vendeuvre-du-Poitou