傅柯性史 04

The History of Sexuality by Foucault

Translated by Springhero 雄伯譯

It will be said that if many people today affirm this repression, the reason is that it is
historically evident. And if they speak of it so abundantly, as they have for such a long
time now, this is because repression is so firmly anchored, having solid roots and
reasons, and weighs so heavily on sex that more than one denunciation will be
required in order to free ourselves from it; the job will be a long one.

有人將會說，今天假如有許多人肯定性壓抑是存在，理由是從歷史來看是太明
顯。但是假如他們如此不厭其煩惱提到性，如同長久以來所為，那是因為壓抑是
如此的根深柢固，對性的壓力是如此重大，以致他們需要不只一次的抗拒，才
能替自己解脫壓抑。這工程將是漫長。

All the longer, no doubt, as it is in the nature of power—to be repressive, and to be

especially careful in repressing useless energies, the intensity of pleasures, and
irregular modes of behavior. We must not be surprised, then, if the effects of liberation
vis-à-vis this repressive power are so slow to manifest themselves; the effort to speak
freely about sex and accept it in its reality is so alien to a historical sequence that has
gone unbroken for a thousand years now, and so inimical to the intrinsic mechanisms
of power, that it is bound to make little headway for a long time before succeeding in
its mission.

壓抑的時間將會更漫長，就權力的本質而言是無庸置疑，因為要壓抑無用的精
力，強烈的歡樂，及踰矩的行為，需要格外的謹慎。假如跟這種壓抑的力量當面
相碰，解放的效果要很慢才能顯現，也就不足為奇。企圖對性肆無忌憚談論，並
在現實中坦然接受，從千年來一成不變的歷史內涵來看，是甚為罕見的，而且
跟權力的結構本質格格不入。所以一定是費了很長時間無多大進展之後，任務才
可能成功。

One can raise three serious doubts concerning what I shall term the “ respressive
hypothesis.” First doubt: Is sexual repression truly an established historical fact? Is
what first comes into view—and consequently permits one to advance an initial
hypothesis—really the accentuation or even the establishment of a regime of sexual
repression beginning in the seventeenth century? This is a properly historical
question.

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對於我所提出「壓抑的假設」這個命題，我們可提出三個疑問：第一個疑問：性
壓抑真的是經過證實的歷史事實嗎？我們首先看到的，結果使我們能夠提出最
初的假設，真的就是開始於十七世紀性壓抑體制所強化，甚至是所建立嗎？這
是歷史是否符合的問題。

Second doubt: do the workings of power, and in particular those mechanisms that are
brought into play in societies such as ours, really belong primarily to the category of
repression? Are prohibition, censorship, and denial truly the forms through which power is
exercised in a general way, if not in every society, most certainly in our own? This is a
historico-theoretical question.

第二個疑問：權力的結構，特別是像我們這樣的社會所運作的機制，真的就是
主要屬於壓抑的種類？禁制、審查、及拒絕，真的就是在我們自己的社會，即使
不是每個社會，權力通常賴以運作的方式嗎？這是歷史跟理論是否搭配的問題。

A third and final doubt: Did the critical discourse that addresses itself to repression come
to act as a roadblock to a power mechanism that had operated unchallenged up that point,
or is it not in fact part of the same historical network as the thing it denounces ( and
doubtless misrepresents) by calling it “ repression”? Was these really a historical
rupture between the age of repression and the critical analysis of repression? This is a
historical-political question.

最後第三個疑問：權力機制勢不可遏地運作到今，處理壓抑的批判論述能充當
阻擋它的路障嗎？批判論述本身，儘管稱乎它所抨擊的事物為「壓抑」（毫無疑
問是認錯對象），其實不就是跟它一樣，都是相同的歷史網絡的一部份？這些
真的是壓抑的時代跟對壓抑批判分析的時代之間的歷史的斷裂？這是歷史跟政
治是否對應的問題。

My purpose in introducing these three doubts is not merely to construct counterarguments

that are symmetrical and contrary to those outlined above; it is not a matter of saying that
sexuality, far form being repressed in capitalists and bourgeois societies, has on the
contrary benefited from a regime of unchanging liberty; nor is a matter of saying that
power in societies such as ours is more tolerant than repressive, and that the critique of
repression, while it may give itself airs of a rupture with the past, actually forms part of a
much older process and, depending on how one chooses to understand this process, will
appear either as a new episode in the lessening of prohibitions, or as a more devious and
discreet form of power.

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我介紹這三個疑問，目的不僅僅是要建構反駁論點，針對前面所述的各項論點
逐一反駁。我並非是要說，性在資本主義及布爾喬亞的社會絲毫沒有受到壓抑，
反而是因為這樣的體制的自由競爭而獲得利益。我也不是要說，像我們這樣的社
會對性是包容，而不是壓抑。對於性壓抑的批判，我們雖然擺出跟以前決裂的姿
態，實際上是先前的過程的餘緒。端賴你選擇如何來理解這個過程，我們的批判
似乎只是減少性的禁制的一個新的插曲，或僅是在權力運作模式較為委婉跟謹
慎。

The doubts I would like to oppose to the repressive hypothesis are aimed less at showing it
to be mistaken than at putting it back within a general economy of discourses on sex in
modern societies since the seventeenth century. Why has sexuality been so widely
discussed, and what has been said about it? What were the effects of power generated by
what was said? What are the links between these discourses, these effects of power, and
the pleasures that were invested by them? What knowledge was formed as a result of this
linkage?

我對壓抑的假設提出這些疑問，目的不是要先顯示它是錯誤的，而是要將它放
置回到自十七世紀以來現代社會對於性的論述的一般運作。為什麼性如此廣泛受
到討論，以及對於性大家都在討論些什麼？大家所討論的會產生怎樣的權力影
響？這些論述，權力的影響，以及這些論述所投注期望的歡樂，他們之間的關
聯是什麼？這些關聯結果形成怎樣的知識？

The object, in short, is to define the regime of power-knowledge-pleasure that sustains the
discourse on human sexuality in our part of the world. The central issue, then ( at least in
the first instance), is not to determine whether one says yes or no to sex, whether one
formulates prohibitions or permissions, whether one asserts its importance or denies its
effects, or whether one refines the words one uses to designate it; but to account for the
fact that it is spoken about, to discover who does the speaking, the positions and
viewpoints from which they speak, the institutions which prompt people to speak about it
and which store and distribute the things that are said.

簡而言之，我的目的是要替權力、知識、及歡樂的體制下個定義，因為他們維持
我們對於人類的性的論述，使我們得以參與這個世界。主要的議題（至少在第一
個例子）因此不是要決定我們對於性是接受或拒絕，我們規劃的是禁制或容許，
我們是重視或漠視性的影響，或是我們談論性時，措詞是否要委婉，而是要說
明性被談論這個事實，要找出是誰在做論述，他們論述時立場跟觀點是什麼，
以及是什麼機構在激勵人們談論性，然後記錄並散播所論述的內容。

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What is at issue, briefly, is the over-all “ discursive fact,” the way in which sex is “
put into discourse.” Hence, too, my main concern will be to locate the forms of power,
the channels it takes, and the discourses it permeates in order to reach the most tenuous
and individual modes of behavior, the paths that give it access to the rare or scarcely
perceivable forms of desire, how it penetrates and controls everyday pleasure—all this
entailing effects that may be those of refusal, blockage, and invalidation, but also
incitement and intensification: in short, the “ polymorphous techniques of power.”

簡而言之，爭議所在是這個全面性的「論述的事實」，也就是，性是如何被擺置
於論述之中。因此，我的主要關心將是要找出權力的形式，權力運作的管道，權
力滲透的論述，這樣我們才有辦法抵達最脆弱而個人化的行為模式，以及權力
是透過怎樣的途徑，才得以滲透到罕見而難於覺察的慾望的形式，跟權力是如
何貫穿並控制我們日常的歡樂。所有這些接續而來的影響，可能都是拒絕、阻擋
及徒勞無功，但也可能是激勵跟強化。總而言之，就是「權力的技巧的多重形態」

And finally, the essential aim will not be to determine whether these discursive
productions and these effects of power lead one to formulate the truth about sex, or on the
contrary falsehoods designed to conceal that truth, but rather to bring out the “ will to
knowledge” that serves as both their support and their instrument.

最後，最主要的目的，不是要決定這些論述的產生跟權力的影響，會導致我們
構想有關性的真相，或相反的，構想被設計來隱藏真相的假相，而是要顯示「追
求知識的意志」，來充當論述產生的支持跟工具。

Let there be no misunderstanding: I do not claim that sex has not been prohibited or barred
or masked or misapprehended since the classical age: nor do I even assert that it has
suffered these things any less from that period on than before. I do not maintain that the
prohibition of sex is a ruse; but it is a ruse to make prohibition into the basic and
constitutive element from which one would be able to write the history of what has been
said concerning sex starting from the modern epoch.

請大家不要誤解：我並沒有宣稱，自十七世紀以來，性就沒有受到禁制、禁止、
掩蓋或誤解。我甚至也沒有主張，從十七世紀開始，性比前受到較少的禁制、禁
止、掩蓋或誤解。我沒有斷言，對於性的禁制是一種策略，我是說，策略所在是
將性的禁制變成基本而組成的因素，根據這個因素，我們才能夠寫作從現代開
始的有關性的討論的歷史。

All these negative elements—defenses, censorships, denials—which the repressive

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hypothesis groups together in one great central mechanism destined to say no, are
doubtless only component parts that have a local and tactical role to play in a
transformation into discourse, a technology of power, and a will to knowledge that are far
from being reducible to the former.

性受到壓抑的假設將這些負面的因素，諸如防衛、審查、及拒絕等，全部聚集在
一個註定要否定性存在的中央的機制裡。可是，這些負面因素，無疑的，僅是扮
演局部及策略的角色所組成的部份。論述的轉移，權力的技巧，跟追求知識的意
志相比，後者完全無法被化簡進入前者。

In short, I would like to disengage my analysis from the privileges generally accorded the
economy of scarcity and the principles of rarefaction, to search instead for instances of
discursive production ( which also administer silences, to be sure), of the production of
power ( which sometimes have the function of prohibiting), of the propagation of
knowledge ( which often cause mistaken beliefs or systematic misconceptions to circulate);
I would like to write the history of these instances and their transformations.

總而言之，我想要將我的分析，跟一般性以稀為貴及多就不稀罕所給予的特權
劃清界線，這樣我才能相反地尋找到論述產生的例子（當然，也有壓抑及沉
默），權力產生的例子（有時有禁制的功用），以及知識的傳播的例子（時常
引起錯誤的信仰或制度的誤解流傳）。我想要寫作有關這些例子跟他們轉變的歷
史。

A first survey made from this viewpoint seems to indicate that since the end of the
sixteenth century, the “ putting into discourse of sex,” far from undergoing a process of
restriction, on the contrary has been subjected to a mechanism of increasing incitement;
that the techniques of power exercised over sex have not obeyed a principle of rigorous
selection, but rather one of dissemination and implantation of polymorphous sexualities;
and that the will to knowledge has not come to a halt in the face of a taboo that must not
be lifted, but has persisted in constituting—despite many mistakes, of course-a science of
sexuality.

這些觀點乍看起來，似乎指示著，自從十七世紀末以來，「性成為論述」絲毫沒
有經歷受到限制的過程，相反的，還屈從於越來越受到獎勵的機制；對於性所
運用的權力的技巧，並沒有遵循嚴格選擇的法則，而是將多重形態的性予以擴
散跟安置；追求知識的意志面臨不可碰觸的禁忌時，並沒有因而怯步，反而持
續建構
一套性的科學，雖然難免錯誤重重。

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It is these movements that I will now attempt to bring into focus in a schematic way,
bypassing as it were the repressive hypothesis and the facts of interdiction or exclusion it
invokes, and starting from certain historical facts that serve as guidelines for research.

我現在企圖將這些運動的過程，以基型模式，會聚處理。我繞過性壓抑的假設的
理論，及其所訴諸於的性被禁制及排除的事實，而從某些歷史的事實開始，並
以這些事實充當研究的指標。

雄伯譯
32hsiung@pchome.com.tw