Entry 2

            I will admit that I struggled a bit with Foucault. I will further admit that I have always struggled a bit with Foucault, for one reason or another. Therefore, I think the following comments on “The Eye of Power” and “Panopticism” may be a bit more of me piecing things together at this point than making any decisive claims about the readings.

            I waded through “Panopticism” on my first reading—in some ways, it was easier to imagine it as a work of science-fiction than critical theory for me. Once Foucault described the tower with the prisoners (p. 200), I imagined a Lord of the Rings-esque vision of the text that served as a backdrop for the rest of my reading. Whether or not this was appropriate for the text, it did help me approach some of the points I was struggling with during the first reading as a thought experiment or fictitious alternate universe during my second reading. In doing so, I thought that the driving points Foucault was making had to do with the perception of power, rather than any real exercise of it. When describing the Panopticon, he says, “To achieve this, it is at once too much and too little that the prisoner should be constantly observed by an inspector: too little, for what matters is that he knows himself to be observed, too much, because he has no need in fact of being so” (p. 201). This was reinforced for me in "The Eye of Power" when he says about the Panopticon, "There is no need for arms, physical violence, material constraints. Just a gaze. An inspecting gaze, a gaze which each individual under its weight will end by interiorising to the point that he is his own overseer, each individual thus exercising this surveillance over, and against, himself" (p.155).
      In these examples, I believe Foucault is setting up the Panopticon as a way of describing power relations, rather than the actual use of power. Control is achieved by suggestion, almost a mute threat. Again, thinking of the Panopticon as the subject of a science-fiction dystopia, people are held hostage by the suggestion that higher forces can observe and control their every move. Whether or not these forces are ever exercised, the prisoners know (or believe) they are there. Or, if they are acted upon, it might be in a fashion similar to the plague narrative Foucault opens with, where all control is done in isolation and the prisoners are trapped by their need (or perceived need) of protection, inability to communicate with one another, and lack of confirmation by their block from the outside world—and because all interaction with the outside world has to be pre-ordained by the controlling powers, it could be entirely constructed and modified before any of the prisoners enter it.

            In terms of teaching, I think that the Panopticon works in many ways in and outside of the classroom when it comes to technology. In the classroom, I think that the perception that students’ web visits are being monitored (even if no one bothers to check) discourages students from goofing around during class time. Instead of browsing Facebook, the Panopticon is watching, and everyone gets put into their little cells where they no longer have the option of interaction. Outside of the classroom, I think that web history works in some of the same ways as the Panopticon (although in a much looser way, as it can be deleted and therefore bypassed quite easily). My best example for this is the fact that Netflix won’t let you delete your viewing history, EVER. My mom, sister, and I watch a television series together, and since they know my Netflix password, I know that if I ever did decide to “cheat” on them and watch the show on my own, at any moment they could log in and call me out on it. The Panopticon cannot lie, so I cannot lie either. For students, if the Panopticon existed in more places that teachers had access to (such as if any student logon information could be tracked and analyzed by the University), it might result in less surfing of non-academic sites while using the University's server—though the consequences of visiting certain sites or at certain frequencies would have to be high enough for this, and I doubt many threats would be able to change a habit and pastime so ingrained in so many people.

            I realize that my reading of Foucault is probably choppy, and has missing pieces, and perhaps relies too much on things already familiar to me, but I feel that my understanding of Foucalt is that way too. Like I said, for some reason he’s always been enormously dense for me to work my way through. This will be a piece I return to throughout the semester to gain more insight on it. I’m looking forward to hearing what the rest of you thought of it.

            My reading of Ohmann, on the other hand, was much smoother, and I found his reading not only very interesting, but still extremely relevant—in fact, so relevant that on page 682 when he references 1990 as the future, I was caught off guard! I think that this article does an excellent job of placing technology within a historical and social context. Comparing the development of technology in the post-Industrial Revolution world and the classism and amount of control allotted to higher classes serves as a good model for how we are using and utilizing technology today. Ohmann writes, “Technology, one might say, is itself a social process, saturated with the power relations around it, continually reshaped according to some people’s intentions” (p. 681). I think this is an effective way for us to think about technology as both teachers and scholars.

While Ohmann doesn’t delve into it as much as I think would be necessary today (for when he is writing, computers in the classroom are much more a possibility of tomorrow or today’s experiment), issues such as economies, class, race, and gender need to be taken into account when looking at students’ use, attitudes, and familiarity with computers.

Computer literacy may be available only to certain demographics. School districts in strong enough economies to afford the newest technology for their students to familiarize themselves with is one example of how access could be limited by social/class structures. Another, in Ohmann’s fashion of analyzing the history of technology use and development, is to look at the groups that have most participated in making computers a standard in the classroom and the home—a group that is predominantly white and male. Their children could potentially have a competitive edge given that technology and computers might be more of a mainstay in their homes than other childrens’. Another issue I think needs to be looked at is the masculinizing of computers and technology. The advertisement Ohmann describes on page 684 is a good example of this trend beginning—the ultimate goal for girls is not necessarily to gain computer literacy (and therefore expanded future possibilities) themselves, but to marry a man who has these skills—the ad culminates in “…and that could affect whom she might marry! Mom was convinced” (p.684). All of these elements might perhaps be present in an updated Ohmann article, but even their absence is forgivable given the fact that Ohmann pays close attention to the relationship between technological development and class throughout the article.

Like I have said a few times already, my understanding of Foucault is a bit foggy, so I don’t think that the Panopticon helped me understand Ohmann anymore than I would have without having read the Foucault. I can apply ideas of the omnipresent Panopticon to the power structures I have touched base on above, but that is much more based on applying Ohmann to Foucault than the other way around. Overall, however, I think that these readings helped delve into the question I presented in a multimodal way in class: Is technology in the classroom “new” if the same groups are accessing and controlling it? I’m glad that our readings are already beginning to help explore that question for me.

           

Ohmann, Richard. "Literacy, Technology, and Monopoly Capital." College English. 47.7 (1985): 675-89. 

Foucault, Michel. "Panopticism." Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison. Trans. Alan Sheridan, 1977. New York: Vintage Books, 1995. 195-228.

Foucault, Michel. "The Eye of Power." Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings. Ed. Colin Gordon. New York: Pantheon Books, 1980. 146-165.