Document Type : Original Article

Author

• Arash Heydari

Assistant professor at university of science and culture-Tehran, iran

Abstract

Encountering history and historiography is often a museum and event encounter. In other words, history, rather than being understood as a current and now flow, is regarded as something from the past and finished, which is far away from us and is like a museum full of interesting objects and events that can be seen or taken advice from them. The present study aims to describe and explain the method of genealogy. For this purpose, the current research first tries to discuss the position and necessity of this theoretical-methodological horizon. Then, the theoretical grounds of this approach are examined from three perspectives of Nietzsche, Weber, and Althusser. Consequently, by focusing on two works of Michel Foucault, this study attempts to explain the principles of this theory method. The final stage of this research also tries to examine some common errors in understanding this approach. The principles emphasized in this study are as follows: genealogy is not an explanation of event by event or tracing a chain of events; genealogy is not just about breaks; genealogy is not the history of thought writing; the speech-non-speech distinction is important; genealogy creates its own archival and documentary system; and genealogy is related to the idea of ​​liberation.

Keywords

• Genealogy
• Discourse
• Historiography
• Power