Anneliese Michel

Performance appraisals and the underlying disciplinary power it exercises in the UK education system Epigraph Disciplinary power is exercised through its invisibility; at the same time, it imposes on those it subjects a compulsory visibility. In discipline, it is the subjects who have to be seen. Their visibility assures the hold of the power that is exercised over them. It is the fact of being constantly seen that maintains the disciplined individual in his subjection (Foucault, 1979, p.…

There are many differing views about democracy, but “currently, there are three prominent streams within pragmatic political philosophy: Deweyan democratic perfectionism, Rortyan ironism, and pragmatist epistemic deliberativism” (Talise 2014 123) that provide for the conception of liberal democracy and its implementation. Though each of these philosophical explanations offer their own unique conception of democracy along with how to fulfill democracy’s enactment, pragmatist epistemic…

Essay I: Ideology, a term that we all know exists, but very few truly understand the essence that lies behind such a word. Many questions arise when one thinks of ideology such as, but not limited to, “What is ideology?” and “Where do individuals come to acquire their ideology, as in is it born into the genetics that make up who they are, or is it created through the experiences of their life?”. Louis Althusser was a 20th century French philosopher that devoted much of his life to the study of…

Over the past two centuries, discourse regarding sex has significantly increased. This has led to the formation of an entire “sexual mosaic.” Michel Foucault contends, throughout the chapter, that the science of sex was essentially made up of evasions; a will to ignorance. The proliferating dialogue in respect to sex, in actuality, served as a way to conceal sex rather than to expose its truths. Foucault delves even further into the types of discourse on sex that was used, specifically, during…

Heather Slawny Ashley Bohrer PHL 233 May 15 2015 Michel Foucault’s Eurocentric Patriarchy Michel Foucault’s The History of Sexuality analyzes how gender, sexuality, and power are perceived jointly. He accomplishes this specifically by considering the “repressive hypothesis” and “bio-power.” The repressive hypothesis is the theory that society has been constructed in a way that makes topics like sex and sexuality taboo, unless this discourse is masked in a euphemized, strictly reproductive manner…

Is there eternal sunshine in the spotless mind? This is the question posed by writers Charlie Kaufman, Michel Gondry and Pierre Bismuth in their movie Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. This movie, directed by Gondry, explores the idea that feelings and emotions are more powerful than memories, and that if we erased all of our memories, we would still possess the feelings and emotions that were created by those memories. The movie was inspired by a male friend of Bismuth who said that he…

In every society there is a form that is followed, a pattern of behavior and a structure that in some ways defines the nature of that society. In the case of Western civilization these structures are explored historically by Michel Foucault and dissected, asking why they are the way they are, what station they occupy in our society and how this affects those of us who live within this civilization. Foucault leads us on a journey fraught with insights to the mystery, terrors and trials of the…

The body in the closet Visibility is not simply about the recognition, identification and categorization of bodies, but it is also how bodies negotiate and exist within systems of power. These are the very dynamics which regulate the invisibility of certain bodies as well. The idea of the ‘closet’ which Sedgwick develops, points at how complicated the promise of invisibility inside the closet and visibility outside the closet is. According to her, culture can be understood through the…

French historian, social theorist, philosopher and public intellectual Michel Foucault is remembered for his means of using historical research to elucidate the changes in discourse over time and the ever growing links between discourse, knowledge, institutions, and power. Born October 15th, 1926 in Poitiers, France, Michel Foucault was the second of three children in a middle-class family. His father, Paul Foucault, was an esteemed local surgeon. Both of Foucault's grandfathers were also…

Foucault was after the concept of a “pure community” he found the existence of a whole set of techniques and institutions for measuring and supervising abnormal beings, as well as bringing into play the disciplinary mechanisms created by fear. All modern mechanisms for controlling abnormal individuals derive from these. Sao Foucault’s overall thoughts on this concept maybe similar to that of the Jeremy Bentham's Panopticon, a building with a tower at the center from which it is possible to see…