Having actually discussed this very point with a French professor of
literature at University of Avignon when we were talking about theory
--I know, talking literary theory in France, how passé!-- it's
FoucaulDian because Foucault was, after all, French, and for native
French speakers it's harder to say T in the middle of the word than it
is to say D (though this may vary regionally --my friend was a Parisian
but teaching in Provence for many years); this difference doesn't really
apply to native English speakers, where the pronunciation is easier to
distinguish between the T and the D. In France, in my experience,
people would pronounce the adjectival form of the proper name Foucault
as the word "FoucaulDian" ("Il aime les travails de Foucault. Ainsi, il
est Foucauldian") and so, presumably, it has been transliterated into
the written French with a D. The problem arises for native French
speakers, I believe, not in that Foucault's name ends in a T (which
isn't pronounced in French anyway), but that it's also preceeded by
several vowels and an L, which makes it hard to pronounce with a hard T
in the middle of the adjectival form.
Anyway, that's my two centimes' worth
Andy
>
> PS. I'm still interested in the 'Foucaultian/Foucauldian'
> question: does anyone have any thoughts?
>
> ___________________________
> Margo Huxley
> Geography
> The Open University
> Milton Keynes
>
--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Andrew Herod
Professor
Department of Geography
University of Georgia
Athens, GA 30602, USA
Ph: + 1 706 542 2856 (main)
+ 1 706 542 2366 (direct)
Fax: + 1 706 542 2388
www.ggy.uga.edu/people/faculty/aherod
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