An Essay On Foucault 's Virtue

Although there are somewhat of similarities between Weber’s and Foucault’s relations of power and dominance, how they evaluate the concepts separately and the ways these concepts are practiced in society, can be distinguished differently. Webber appears to occupy the polar opposite with the respect to his claims of how power becomes existent with bureaucratic instruments and bureaucracy itself, Foucault argues that the power relations are everywhere in society and with expansive elements; society has no option but to internalize (Shaw 2011). His explanation of power is much broader than Weber’s. Focault rejects the hierarchical models of power, and believed that relations of dominance are formations of unequal power (McClaren 2002), and over time domination may seem fixed in society’s social structure (Shaw 2011). Additionally, Foucault looks at the concept of power from a functional strategy, with the functional practices administered by authority, and emphasises that authority commonly uses discursive power and the operation of discourse to maintain the dominance (Smart 2010; Shaw 2011). What is compelling about Foucault’s concept of power are his discursive claims. Unlike Webber, he suggests that power relations are not necessarily derived from state practices, but are all under state control, and highlights that “state and hegemony is in the every area of life” (Shaw 2011). Further, to understand some of Foucault’s functional examples, he focuses on the everyday lives of

For example in the setting of a workplace the power does not pass from the top down; instead it circulates through their organizational practices. Such practices act like a grid, provoking and inciting certain courses of action and denying others. Foucault considers this as no straightforward matter and believes that it rests on how far individuals interpret what is being laid down as "obvious" or "self evident", institutional power works best when all parties accept it willingly. Foucault's notion of power is a difficult notion to grasp principally because it is never entirely clear on who has the power in the first place, once the idea is removed that power must be vested in someone at the top of the ladder, it becomes much more difficult to identify what power is or where and whom it lies with. Foucault believes that we are used to thinking about power as an identifiable and overt force and that this view is simply not the case, because it is taken for granted that the above statement is true then it is much more complicated to comprehend power as a guiding force that does not show itself in an obvious manner.

Panopticism is a social theory named after the Panopticon, according to Foucault, his describes a watch tower in a prison and he thinks Panopticism is how people act different when they’re being watched. Rayner perspective on Panopticism is how we can use social media to our advantage. In this essay, I will analyze both Foucault and Rayner perspective on Panopticism and will determine the rhetorical appeals of both writings.

Foucault began to compare this new idea of surveillance, power and punishment of the Panopticon to the power during the Middle Ages by the King which was more public in contrast to the Panopticon. The Panopticon was more discrete. It was not a show or form of entertainment when someone was punished unlike when someone is punished with the King. By exploring this, Foucault demonstrated how surveillance has changed overtime.

Foucault's "Panopticism" (1979) is a careful piece that talks about how a panoptic framework would impact culture, society, the political, and individuals. Foucault describes panopticon is to “induce the inmate a state of conscious and visibility that assures the automatic function of power.” Foucault mentions, surveillance has a lasting effects, regardless of the fact that it is discontinuous in its activity; that the perfection of power ought to render its real unneeded practice. The Inmates are in a dominating circumstance that they are them-selves the bearers. Foucault (201, 202–3) also mentions that "He who is subjected to a field of visibility, and knows it, expect responsibility regardless of the constrains of power; he makes them play spontaneously upon

It is not the same as sex and it is not the same as women. Gender is determined by the origination of tasks, functions and roles attributed to women and men in society and in public and private life.

     The Panopticon, a prison described by Foucault, “is a machine for dissociating the see/being seen dyad: in the peripheric ring, one is totally seen, without ever seeing” (321, Foucault). This literally means that in the formation of the panopticon those who are being seen can not see one another and the one who sees everything can never be seen. That is the most important tool of the panopticon. Foucault makes this assumption about today’s society by saying that we are always being watched whether we know it or not. One always keeps an eye over their shoulder as a

Michel Foucault’s work within philosophy has made important impacts when it comes to understanding how power affects a capitalist state. Believed that history of a country should how the past created a better future for society but in most cases through history, that was not the case. One of the examples that Foucault uses is how the mentally ill were treated in the Renaissance compared to the 18th century. During the Renaissance period, the mental ill people were allowed to seen within society and were seen as useful and gave wisdom into their society rather than in the 18th century. People with mental illness were put away and see as a burden to society and seen as needed to being cured by sinister people. Another example that Foucault discuss

Foucault is the author behind Panopticism. While reading his article, for starters it was very hard to comprehend what he was trying to say, I found this article very confusing and irritating! However, this article does provide different types of elements that can be used to agree to his theory. In this article, he uses Ethos to persuade people that he knows what he’s talking about. He used Logos to persuade other about the effects discipline. He uses Kairos, to address different points about discipline. He lastly uses Pathos to connect to the audience emotionally to prove his theory about discipline.

Foucault in theorizing the relationship between power and knowledge basically focused on how power operated in the institutions and in its techniques. The point is how power was supported by knowledge in the functioning of institutions of punishment. “He places the body at the centre of the struggles between different formations of power/knowledge. The techniques of regulation are applied to the body” (Wheterell et al., 2001: 78)

In her article, “Foucault, Femininity, and the Modernization of Patriarchal Power”, Bartkey begins by summarizing philosopher Michel Foucault’s literary analysis of the Panopticon and how the prison system works tying it to modern society. Foucault begins by using the example of a student who is forced to sit in assigned seating based of class ranking. The scrutiny the student faces forces him to sit upright; he must keep feet his feet on the floor; his head must stay erect; and he may not slouch or fidget. With

Society has struggled with the term of gender for several years. Gender has now become such an important part in our community that we have incorporated it in our everyday lives. We have changed our outlooks of femininity/masculinity, our choice of jobs in the workforce, our places in the world have dramatically changed by this thing called gender.

Many published articles about Foucault’s work are available, one author being O’Farrel (2005) who praises Foucault’s writing as a modern cultural icon; his theories seem radical for the time they were set in; O’Farrel claiming him as a Gay Saint due to his theories behind homosexuality or radical militant in protest committees. She highlights his style of writing well, in his words “the obligation to tell all, even to satisfy the jury of assembled specialists”; in order to find his underlining meanings or arguments in his articles the detail has to be stripped (O’Farrel, 2005). This review is based on two things; the work that I discuss will lack the detail he provides in his arguments and that his published work covers a wide range of disciplines. So for this essay I have chosen three diverse topics to try gain a full understanding of Foucault’s work: ‘Alternatives to the Prison (1976)’; ‘The Crisis of Medicine or the Crisis of Anti-medicine (1974)’; ‘Spaces of Security (1978).’ This essay aims to critically discuss these three articles and find Foucault’s underlying messages.

French historian and philosopher Michel Foucault, was born in Poitiers, France October 15, 1926. He was the professor of the History of Systems of Thought and also was the founder of Groupe d’information sur les prisons He wrote “ Introduction” to Dream and Existence by Ludwig Binswanger who was a Heideggerian psychiatrist and wrote “Malasle mentale et personalite” which was a short book on mental illness. He supported structuralist and poststructuralist movements and also protested on behalf of homosexuals. Some of the things he studied and wrote books for was Discipline and Punishment, The History of Sexuality, Madness and Civilization, The Order of Things, The Archaeology, The Birth of The Clinic, The Birth of Biopolitics, Society Must Be Defended, Power/ Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings, Security, Territory, Population,, Aesthetics Method and Epistemology, This is not a Pipe, Fearless Speech and so many more. He was an early victim of AIDS, which lead to his death in Paris on June 25, 1984, but his work still impacts us today and others after him including: Gilles Deleuze, Sigmund Freud, Martin Heidegger, Erving Goffman and Georges Canguilhem. One thing

For Foucault you cannot understand imprisonment without looking at torture first and how they both correlate to one another. Throughout this essay I will assess Foucault’s theories about torture and his views of how it has come about. I will look at how torture is a technique and the forms of disciplinary techniques that accompany torture. I will assess the power structures and how it manifests into other institutions in today’s society. Lastly how torture is needed to understand imprisonment. Torture was used as a scare tactic in the past to keep individuals under control. Society was aware of what may occur to them if they disobeyed the law. This initiated power and discipline over citizens which helps us to understand power relations today in terms of imprisonment.