French Theory: Foucault, Derrida, Deleuze & Cie et les mutations de la vie intellectuelle aux Etats-Unis (review)

From the very title of his book, François Cusset sets the mood: it is about the American incarnation of late twentieth-century French thought, analyzed with a hint of irony and a lot of hip-ness.

Cusset launches a massive and important project: tracing the trajectory of poststructuralism in the United States, from its actual discovery through its development in the semi-isolation of academia, to its implications in society, culture, politics and art. Finally, he considers the dichotomous or even plural nature of its destiny, so different in France from the United States and other cultural territories .