Panopticism Is Oppression

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Panopticism is a form of oppression that requires a detainee to be watched at any given time and a person in charge to watch over them. There are many essays on the subject of oppression, many have differing themes but many seem to have the same collective factor; that the common person will always have a watchdog that makes sure that they are kept in line. In the essay Panopticism, Michael Foucault shares his belief that power is defined as the act of being viewed and that this power is obtained through the act of viewing, history, and knowledge. Many people use power as a way to oppress those unfortunate enough to be beneath them and Foucault shows how panopticism in prevalent in situations in which power defines status. In this essay, I will be defining panopticism and showing the different forms that oppression can take, using Five Faces of Oppression by Iris Marion Young and Arts of Contact Zone by Mary Louise Pratt. Foucault bases his theory of viewing and power on Bentham’s Panopticon, an architectural structure that allows one to view without being viewed. The structure consists of an annular building, inside of a central tower that is surrounded by individual cells. “The Panopticon is a machine for dissociating the see/being seen dyad: in the peripheric ring, one is totally seen, without ever seeing; in the central tower, one sees everything without ever being seen (Foucault 201-202).” The design was established primarily for inmates in prison during the mid-1800’s, but as society modernizes so did the blueprints of the Panopticon. The structure of a Panopticon can be seen today in schools, hospitals, shopping malls, prisons, mental institutions, and even the work place. “It makes it possible to draw up differences: among patients, to observe the symptoms of each individual, without the proximity of beds, the circulation of miasmas, the effects of
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