Comparison Of Ways Of Seeing And Berger's Theory Of Panopticism

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.

From the concrete walls, the schematics of Architecture and even the way that we are taught, school can remind us of a type of prison. We are taught by repetition and to regurgitate information rather than actually go in depth to understand the topic. We are ready to absorb information and not question said info. We are like fishes swimming in a bowl, unable to comprehend what exists outside of our own sphere of learning. In an essay written by Foucault, he talks about the idea of the Panopticon. When reading his essay, it becomes clear there are striking similarities between the Panopticon and the schooling system. It is my intent to show how both the schooling system and the Panopticon strip Individuality away because of mechanical teaching. This will be conveyed by showing the comparisons of the Panopticon and the schooling system through the topics of how describing the similarity of the two locations and lead into the course of Surveillance on both subjects. I will then lead into the topic of Discipline shaping behavior and will finalize with discussing how the general architecture of schools and the Panopticon are similar.

To start, is Foucault 's Panopticism. Panopticism uses the idea of Bentham’s Panopticon to elaborate the disciplinary ideas that he is trying to explain. The Panopticon is an “all seeing” structure that makes observations without the people ever knowing when they were being watched, even though it is clearly visible (Foucault, 204). Its gaze can be upon anyone, from a “madman, a patient, a condemned man” (Foucault, 200). These features allow Panopticism to be a passive power, rather than an active one. With this in mind, power is shifted from the hands of the individual to the anonymous “supervisor” of the Panopticon (Foucault, 200). This method of observation facilitates the transformation of individuals to controllable individuals (Foucault, 205).

From a towering architectural manifestation stationed in Saint Petersburg, a television surveillance system labeled “Big Brother,” and the everyday global positioning system located in handheld devices, the Panopticon in all forms has been an attempt at total surveillance. In order to understand the literal and metaphorical panopticons as concepts of total surveillance, we must first define their most prominent features and components, which include geography, cost and benefit. This can be done by examining the generality of the Panopticon’s nature, the concept behind the making, how people can better understand concepts, and both the literal and metaphorical forms of the panopticon.

The final sentence reveals the Panopticon’s true purpose: a political tool. The previous sentences break down the previously configured definition of the Panopticon and with this final piece, Foucault finishes redefining the term. Understanding that limiting the definition of the Panopticon would eliminate its functionality, Foucault chooses to interpret it loosely without assigning a set meaning to it. Thus, allowing the concept of the Panopticon to be used in other subject areas and not just as a tool for prisons. John Berger also addresses a similar issue through the example of artwork in his text, “Ways of Seeing”. Berger’s description of present day reproductions of images from the past explains how past processes can find use in the present through interpreting the essence of its meaning. More specifically, Berger believes that we can assign several different uses to objects of the past because the information that they provide remains the same even if the actual, physical object does not. “It is not a question of reproduction failing to reproduce certain aspects of an image faithfully; it is a question of reproduction making it possible, even inevitable, that an image will be used for many different purposes and that the reproduced image,

Michel Foucault wrote a book called History of Sexuality. In Part five of the book Right of Death and Power over Life, he discusses about the historical “Sovereign Power” where one is allowed to decide who has the right to live and who has the right to die. The sovereign uses his power over life through the deaths that he can command and uses his authority to announce death by the lives he can spare. Foucault then moves on to Disciplinary Power where he came up with the “Panopticon” where one is to believe they were under surveillance at all times. Such surveillance is still used in our everyday life such as schools, prisons, offices, hospitals, and mental institutes. Later in his life, Foucault discovered Bio-power. This bio-power

Panopticism is a social theory named after the “panopticon”, which was originally developed by the French philosopher, Michel Foucault. Panopticon was first mentioned in his book, Discipline and Punish. In his book, he refers "panopticon" to “an experimental laboratory of power in which behaviour could be modified.” Foucault considered panopticon as a symbol of the “disciplinary society of surveillance” (Panopticism). In the two novels, Nineteen Eighty-Four and Frankenstein, panopticism is an element shown greatly. Though these two novels have many differences, this similarity shared between the two is equally important.

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.

“The Panopticon functions as a kind of laboratory of power,” Foucault declares; indeed, much knowledge can be ascertained by “penetra[ting] into men’s behavior” (379).

dealing simply with subjects, or even with a “people,” but with a “population,” with its specific phenomena and its peculiar variables." (298/25) This is where we begin to see Foucault's concept of Biopower come into play. One of the central themes of Foucault's writing, he defines biopower as "[T]he forms of power, the channels it takes, and the discourses it permeates in order to reach the most tenuous and individual modes of behavior, the paths that give it access to the rare or scarcely perceivable forms of desire, how it penetrates and controls everyday pleasure—all this entailing effects that may be those of refusal, blockage, and invalidation, but also incitement and intensification: in short, the 'polymorphous techniques of power.'” (292/11 For Foucault, Biopower relates to the government's concern with fostering the life of the population, but is also a form of complete control of that population through surveillance or perceived surveillance. Foucault believed that Biopower permeates through the

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.

The author of the essay “Panopticism”, Michel Foucault gives his opinion on power and discipline in Panopticism. He describes Jeremy Bentham’s “Panopticon”, a tower in the centre of a room which has vision to every cell, generalized for prisoners. In simple words, it functioned in maintaining discipline throughout the jail. It’s most distinctive feature was that; prisoners could be seen without ever seeing. Prisoners would never really know when they are watched and when not. They are always under the impression that someone is keeping an eye on them continuously and if anything goes wrong, or they make mistake, they would be punished severely. Since, a prisoner would never know when he/she is watched, they have to be at their best. In a

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.

According to Foucault, power does not belong to the individual, but to the system, to the institution. In his essay on Discipline and Punish, Foucault presents his idea of the panopticon mechanism, a mechanism in which visibility is a trap. With little importance over the actual individual in the role of the observer or of the observed, the object of the system is total power over the observed. Due to the unique shape of the panopticon, there are no corners and thus no blind spots for the observed to hide in. The private space is replaced by the public one. Furthermore, as final evidence of total control, the observed never knows for sure if they are being watched or not, as they can’t see the observer (Foucault 200-205). Foucault further argues that this system is followed by any government institution, placing the society under permanent observation. Individuals might try to evade the system, but achieving liberation and freedom is not something that anyone could do. Dostoevsky’s famous novel, Crime and

In “Ways of Seeing”, John Berger, an English art critic, argues that images are important for the present-day by saying, “No other kind of relic or text from the past can offer such direct testimony about the world which surrounded other people at other times. In this respect images are more precise and richer literature” (10). John Berger allowed others to see the true meaning behind certain art pieces in “Ways of Seeing”. Images and art show what people experienced in the past allowing others to see for themselves rather than be told how an event occurred. There are two images that represent the above claim, Arnold Eagle and David Robbins’ photo of a little boy in New York City, and Dorothea Lange’s image of a migratory family from Texas; both were taken during the Great Depression.