Michael Foucault's Panopticon

338 Words1 Page
bulb-icon

Recommended: Surveillance and privacy

In this passage from "Panopticon" Michael Foucault presents an interesting argument that we live in a society of surveillance. People learn to behave or the personality they develop is from watching others. Powerful people try to study individual to find out why they act or think the way they do to. After finding the answers these people use their knowledge to control people and make them think certain way. Panopticon prison is one of the biggest example of this because it shows how zero guard can control thousands of prisoners. Where before it took hundreds of people to control that many prisoners. what panopticon does is, it puts fear in people's mind that they are being watched all the time. In panopticon the guard is placed in middle of

Show More
Related

  • Julia's Passive Resistance: A Study in Orwell's Dystopia

    789 Words  | 2 Pages

    However, there are other critiques that take a different approach on the oppression that exists in the novel. In "Urban Panopticism And Heterotopic Space In Kafka 's Der Process And Orwell 's Nineteen Eighty-Four,” Raj Shah argues that the way in which society in novel is oppressed is not an obvious oppression but one that focuses on constant surveillance. He uses Foucault’s arguments on panopticism to describe this. Shah states, “Foucault neologizes panopticism to describe a form of power relying not on overt repression, but rather upon the continuous surveillance of a population and the consequent strict regulation of the body” (703). He explains it is the constant surveillance that strips individuals of their rights and places them under oppression. He goes on to

    Read More

  • Analysis Of Michel Foucault

    1042 Words  | 3 Pages

    Is Michel Foucault a historian or not? At the beginning of the analysis on Foucault’s historical analysis, what should be acknowledged is that none of Foucault’s works refer to his previous ones and every work is based upon a new construction of theory and method which shakes the standard norms of history writing and put his methods under suspicion by some historians. On the other hand, many others favor his work; because of Foucault’s specific approach, Gutting calls him as an ‘intellectual artisan’ who was an expert of producing intellectual equivalents of material objects and especially three kinds of them which are history, theory and myth. (Gutting 1996, 3-6) Thomas Flynn answers this question by claiming that Foucault’s all major works are histories of a

    Read More

  • Panopticon: Surveillance, Freedom and Fear

    966 Words  | 2 Pages

    You are alone in a dark cell. You are fearful because you know that you are being watched, but you do not know who is watching you or when you are being watched. You are suddenly conscious of every move you make because you are aware that someone is monitoring every inhale, every exhale, and every little aspect of your life. This is the concept of Jeremy Bentham’s “Panopticon.”

    Read More

  • Michel Foucault's "Panopticism"

    937 Words  | 2 Pages

    Michel Foucault's "Panopticism" is based on the architectural concept of the panopticon. Foucault extended this concept to create a new sort of authority and disciplinary principle. His idea was that of the anonymous watchers hold in and has the power to influence the ones being watched. This concept is two fold – it is subject to the person being watched not being able to know when they are being watched and to the rules of society places on individuals on how they should act in a given situation. This idea can be applied to every day life, like how we set up testing rooms for students or when reading literary works such as Dracula by Bram Stoker. In Dracula, there are power differentials caused by a character or characters "seeing" what others do not and caused by societal constructions.

    Read More

  • Foucault’s Panopticism and Its Application Within Modern Education Systems

    1703 Words  | 4 Pages

    ‘Theorizing Surveillance: The panopticon and beyond’, UK: Willan Publishing. LYON, D (ed.) (2003), ‘Surveillance as Social Sorting’, UK: Routledge. OLSEN, M (1999), ‘Michel Foucault: Materialism and Education’, Connecticut: Bergin & Garvey.

    Read More

  • Analyzing David Eggers 'The Circle'

    1041 Words  | 3 Pages

    It also shows how Foucault the idea of being watched for long periods of time of no privacy, it will cause them to feel insane since there are no communications being exchanged as if they are an object only being observed for information.

    Read More

  • Essay On Panopticism

    1132 Words  | 3 Pages

    Foucault, in his essay, “Panapticism”, emphasizes the idea of the panopticon, which originated as an idea to keep prisoners under constant surveillance. This idea, as Foucault says is “all-seeing”. This prison structure proposed by Bentham ...

    Read More

  • Michel Foucault's Panoptic Analysis

    369 Words  | 1 Pages

    Theories of social control can also extend into the surveillance mechanisms of criminal and self-disciplinary actions by individuals in the workplace (Grey 1994; 479). An analysis of Michel Foucault’s theory on Panoptic techniques in the workplace, can be heavily related to the surveillance mechanisms of CCTV and the desired outcome of what these surveillance mechanisms seek to achieve. The Panoptic technique seeks to draw attention to the use of surveillance to bring attention to anti-social behaviours of people in society. This surveillance mechanism is relatable to CCTV, as CCTV is used to deter potential offenders from committing crimes and to promote a safe working environment, and to promote self-discipline. The panoptic surveillance

    Read More

  • Jeremy Bentham Panopticism

    638 Words  | 2 Pages

    According to David Lyon in his introduction “The search for surveillance theories”, “The panopticon refuses to go away.” (4). The prison architecture invented by Jeremy Bentham became the crucial ‘diagram’ for Foucault. It places an emphasis on self-discipline as the archetypical modern mode, replacing the previous coercive and brutal methods – “it reverses the principle of the dungeon; or rather its three functions – to enclose, to deprive light, and to hide – it preserves only the first and eliminates the other two” (Foucault 200). In 1975, Foucault coined the term ‘panopticism’ in his book Discipline and Punish, which quickly became used to describe Bentham’s utilitarian theory as a whole. However, there has been much debate amongst Bentham scholars as to whether Bentham would have appreciated Foucault’s interpretation of the Panoptic. Philip Schofield writes, “It would have seemed very odd to Bentham, who regarded his Panopticon prison as humane, and an enormous improvement on the practice of the criminal justice system of the time” (qtd. in Ernst-Brunon 2-3). This discrepancy between an increasingly attractive Bentham and a still repulsive Panopticon is largely to be attributed to Foucault. If Foucault’s interpretation of the Pantopticon has made Bentham’s work known to a wider audience, conversely it has also turned Bentham into a forerunner of Big Brother. Bentham scholars have consistently lamented Bentham’s bad name among the general public and Foucault’s hand in the matter.

    Read More

  • Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World

    395 Words  | 1 Pages

    There were quite a few changes made from Aldous Huxley’s, Brave New World to turn it into a “made for TV” movie. The first major change most people noticed was Bernard Marx’s attitude. In the book he was very shy and timid toward the opposite sex, he was also very cynical about their utopian lifestyle. In the movie Bernard was a regular Casanova. He had no shyness towards anyone. A second major deviation the movie made form the book was when Bernard exposed the existing director of Hatcheries and Conditioning, Bernard himself was moved up to this position. In the book the author doesn’t even mention who takes over the position. The biggest change between the two was Lenina, Bernard’s girlfriend becomes pregnant and has the baby. The screenwriters must have made this up because the author doesn’t even mention it. The differences between the book and the movie both helped it and hurt it.

    Read More

  • Capitalism And Capitalism

    2148 Words  | 5 Pages

    In his book titled Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison, Michel Foucault explores the beginning of the modern-day prison system and the culture of surveillance that it has created. Foucault argues that the modern penal system is one that executes mental and psychological punishment w...

    Read More

  • Mass Surveillance and the Panopticon Analysis

    1438 Words  | 3 Pages

    In Michael Foucault’s “Discipline and Punish”, the late eighteen century English philosopher Jeremy Bentham's model of Panopticon was illustrated as a metaphor for the contemporary technologies of mass surveillance.

    Read More

  • Smile, You’re On Camera

    909 Words  | 2 Pages

    ...ons and ideas of panopticism. By adding the modern day twist and use of recently developed technology, Mr. Gray opens the door to a new age of modern day panopticons that can be implemented by practically any willing party. The modern day relation of such mechanisms seems to break down even the most complicated aspects of Foucault’s “Panopticism” into the simplest of nonprofessionals’ terms. Gray’s article tackled the effectiveness of Foucault’s ideas in modern society and successfully arrived at the conclusion that as technology advances, the ability to employ a more “perfect” Panopticon becomes simpler and simpler with each advance in surveillance.

    Read More

  • Michel Foucault’s Essay, Panopticism”,Panopticon and the Society

    945 Words  | 2 Pages

    Michel Foucault’s essay, “Panopticism”, links to the idea of “policing yourself” or many call it panopticon. The panopticon is a prison which is shaped like a circle with a watchtower in the middle. The main purpose of the panopticon was to monitor a large group of prisoners with only few guards in the key spot. From that key spot, whatever the prisoners do they can be monitored, and they would be constantly watched from the key spot inside the tower. The arrangement of panopticon is done in excellent manner that the tower’s wide windows, which opened to the outside and kept every cell in 360-degree view. The cells were designed so it makes impossible for the prisoners to glances towards the center. In short, none of the prisoners were able to see into the tower. The arrangement of cells guaranteed that the prisoner would be under constant surveillance. This is the beauty of the panopticon that anyone can glance at the cells from the tower but no prisoners can see the tower. The prisoners may feel like someone is watching, and know the he or she is powerless to escape its watch, but the same time, the guard in the tower may not be looking at the prisoners. Just because the prisoners think that someone is watching them, they will behave properly.

    Read More

  • Surveillance Society Essay

    2040 Words  | 5 Pages

    Drawing on the work of Foucault, discuss the claim that ‘we live in a surveillance society’.

    Read More

More about Michael Foucault's Panopticon

Open Document