Citation

Jaworski K. Soc. Ident. 2010; 16(5): 675-687.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2010, Informa - Taylor and Francis Group)

DOI

10.1080/13504630.2010.509572

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

In the essay, 'What is an Author?', Michel Foucault contends that 'the author does not precede the works'. If this is the case, then what happens when the notion of the author as never outside discourse is grafted to suicide? What happens when suicide - most commonly defined as a deliberate taking of one's life - is read through the idea that the one who is doing the taking does not precede it? Does this not obliterate agency in suicide: the key ingredient necessary to marking the individual as the sole author of their death? This article responds to these questions by first considering what Foucault's contention might offer to understanding the constitution of agency in the act of suicide. The author then draws on elements of Judith Butler's work to consider a way of thinking of suicide which furthers Foucault's contribution. The article argues that positioning suicide as already part of discourse does not undermine the individual as the author of death, or makes the act of taking one's life any less deliberate.

CONCLUSIONS are then drawn with a comment on Foucault's position on death being power's limit, and what this might mean for understanding suicide. 1363-0296 online. © 2010 Taylor & Francis.

Language: en

Keywords

Foucault; suicide; Suicide; Agency; social theory; Author; Performative; Relational