Discipline And Punish By Foucault: An Analysis

In Discipline and Punish, Foucault explains how disciplinary power is used to produce subjects who internalize power and as a result, regulate themselves as their own jailors. Jeremy Bentham’s Panopticon model is brought up as a prime example of a form of technological power used in the mid- 19th Century to generate this disciplinary power. The model uses a tower which is placed at the center of a circular prison building. From this tower, the wardens and guards are able to view any prisoner at any time without their knowledge. The potential fear and risk of being observed are enough for prisoners to evoke socially acceptable behaviours and as a result, a form of self-surveillance develops where the prisoners internalize the gaze of the jailer …show more content…
While games and the elements of games have been incorporated into many aspects of life throughout history, the term ‘gamification’ was first documented in 2008, and only in 2010, gained momentum (Figure 1). As a result, gamification can be viewed as a newer and modern form of bio-power that is used to help control, influence, and manage individuals. Deterding et al. were the first to propose a working definition, defining gamification as
"the use of game design elements in non-game contexts. This working definition is necessarily broad in order to convey the variety of gamification examples. Still, we believe it articulates a useful differentiation between gamification, serious games, and playful interaction clarifying discourse and allowing research to move into a detailed study of the defined phenomena …show more content…
This improvement of gamification is seen in a health app called Zombies, Run! (Franklin 2,3, cite one more). With almost four million downloads, a quarter of a million active, the application Zombies, Run! was designed with the goal to motivate people to run faster and more often (cite). Zombies, Run! is one of the few companies that have set a new standard regarding how we should view gamification. As mentioned before, there have been several attempts to gamify aspects of human life; however many fail on the basis that the game does not attract enough interest, is made with no clear goal in mind or is not executed correctly. However, Zombies, Run! is arguably the opposite. It has garnered attention, it has a clear aim in mind and has been executed very well. Zombies, Run! is an excellent example of a gamification application within the health industry that has stood out due to its creative and well thought out game design, popularity, and favorable