Archeology as methodology and biopolitics as speech

Abstract

We will deal here with the Foucaultian itinerary, associated with the notion of Biopolitics, politics of life, or how political economy builds discourses that directly affect the field of Education, in research itineraries (methodologies?) that use or not the Foucaultian perspective. This article is divided into three parts, namely, (1) archeology as “scientific methodology”, (2) methodological itineraries as discourse and (3) biopolitics as discursive production. In the first part, we will study the notion of Foucault's archeology as a method of research and discursive production. In the second part, we will analyze three research itineraries from three articles: National Common Curriculum Base: new forms of sociability producing meanings for education, by Elizabeth Macedo (2014); Curriculum reforms and initial training: knowledge and professionalization, by Maria Manuela Alves Garcia (2015); and The business reformers of education and the dispute for control of the pedagogical process at school, by Luiz Carlos Freitas (2014). Finally, we will analyze the effects of political economy and the market, through the notions of homo oeconomicus and biopolitics as a methodology for the production of discourses.