Paul Rabinow

Paul Rabinow spent his academic career as a prominent professor at the University of California, Berkeley. He helped establish the university's renowned program in the anthropology of the contemporary.

He gained early recognition for his 1977 book "Reflections on Fieldwork in Morocco," which offered a critical, highly personal look at his own fieldwork experience. It remains a foundational text on the subjective nature of the anthropologist's gaze.

Yes, Rabinow collaborated extensively with the French philosopher Michel Foucault and later wrote about his theories. He even co-edited "The Foucault Reader," a major compilation of the philosopher's essays published in 1984.

Coined by Rabinow, this concept focuses on studying the present moment and how modern scientific, technological, and political changes shape human existence. It shifts anthropology away from strictly studying traditional societies to analyzing modernity itself.