The Principle of his own Subjection: Michel Foucault and Panopticism

Twentieth Century French historian Michel Foucault introduces his power theory of Panopticism in his book Discipline and Punish by using the leper plague as an example of its development. Because the leper was terribly contagious, each member in the plagued town was quarantined and required to, on a daily basis, reveal her face in the window as a means of surveillance: a mechanism confirming those who fell victim to the disease and those who survived. Simultaneously, the separation confined each individual to her own space and established a regulating order to the controversy within the society.

Foucault's theory of Panapticism is based on the Panopticon: a prison building designed by English theorist Jeremy Bentham in 1785. The building was designed in order for an omniscient viewer to be able to see the entirety of the happenings within the building while simultaneously be entirely unseen.

Foucault writes, “The major effect of the Panopticon [is] to induce in the inmate a state of conscious and permanent visibility that assures the automatic functioning of power" (554). Power relations are implemented in Panopticsm by imposing absolute and "understood" rules.

In John Hughes's 1985 cult classic The Breakfast Club, five high school students are forced to spend an entire Saturday in the library serving detention. Detention is a form of punishment where students contemplate the fallacies they have committed without misbehaving further. Foucault would consider detention as one of the "tactics of individualizing disciplines [that] are imposed on the excluded" (553). The students are assigned to sit in the library on a day when there are no other students or teachers present. Principal Richard "Dick" Vernon serves as physical surveillance, but in actuality, he has little power over the students.

In this brief clip, each student sits unsupervised, each occupying himself until falling asleep from boredom. When the Principle discovers the students sleeping, he attempts to use verbal authority by screaming, "WAKE UP!" The students ignore him until he calmly offers a trip the “lavatory.” If the hired authority has no control, then why do the students stay for detention the remainder of the day?

Though they show little respect to the principle, the students adhere to the role of the school as an institution itself. Through their actions throughout the movie, the students reveal their awareness of ideological rules. Regardless, the students break free from the library at various moments to run around the school rebelling against the principle. Although they do not remain seated in their original library seat for eight hours, it is significant to note that the students are submissive to Panopticsm theory. The five students remain within the walls of the school for the entirety of the day confirming the power of the school itself and thus reaffirming Foucault’s idea that, “A real subjection is born mechanically from a fictitious relation. So it is not necessary to use force to constrain the convict to good behavior” (555).

Works Cited

Foucault, Michel. “Discipline and Punish.” Literary Theory: An Anthology. Second Ed. Julie Rivkin & Michael Ryan. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing Ltd., 2004. 549-565. Print.

Shall I compare Thee to a coin-operated toy?

I was asked to create my very own "ism." Me, the theorist! My Major Critical Theories class began with a task: define what I think is the most important thing to consider when interpreting a text.

Following the assignment was a five minute visual: a YouTube clip from the 1968 movie Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. The scene established a juxtaposition between a man and a woman each dressed up as a doll, only the woman plays the role of "a doll on a music box that's wound by a key," and the Raggedy Andy-type breaks free from his containing box to wind the key himself. “Andy” contrasts her in almost every way. The doll on a music box is completely bound and controlled.

Having never seen the movie before, I found the clip charming and fascinating - noticing the relevance of my "ism" (paying close attention to patterns, themes and connections) throughout the text. Control, gender and sex are three of the many themes prevalent in the scene.

Aside from my response to the original question at hand, I immediately thought of the relationship between this scene and a contemporary song called “Coin-Operated Boy” by the American "brechtian punk cabaret" known as the Dresden Dolls.

Gender roles have reversed in this example. In Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, an attractive girl is being "wound up" on a music box - "waiting for love’s true kiss" and to be saved (from going in circles). Amanda Palmer, the singer of the Dresden Dolls reverses the gender roles that are depicted in the movie clip – she turns her boy (or doll) on with a coin instead of a key.

Coin operated boy
Sitting on the shelf he is just a toy
But I turn him on and he comes to life
Automatic joy
That is why I want
A coin operated boy

Interesting how over thirty years after Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, human beings are still be objectified through mediums of art by way of dolls.