Foucault - Courtney Sparling

On Thursday, my CMC 200 class was discussing surveillance and the collection of data that in the world today pretty much invades our lives without us even knowing. I had no idea that our phone calls are being recorded and that the ads of Facebook are tailored to our interests and key words used in our other various searches and website visits. It is kind of scary to know that we really don't have as much privacy as we think we have. It reminds me of George Orwell's 1984. Except much worse. Whereas the novel shows how Big Brother overtly controls the people of Oceania, today we are being manipulated in the most concealed ways without our knowledge. 

Bentham's Panopticon Design

We also talked about the idea of a Panopticon, which Foucault talks about in this reading. It is a building with a central tower (like the one in the picture below) looking at the cells of that institution/prison. The concept of Bentham's design was to allow a watchman to watch all the inmates in their cells without them being able to tell if they were being watched. This is very similar to what is happening today with surveillance. From GPS to Internet browsing to just walking down the street, ect. we are being watched and don't even know it. 

I think that it is also important to digest the quote in the image above. It is a place where prison inmates do not even need to be held back by bars, chains, or locks. This building has the power "to induce in the inmate a state of conscience and permanent visibility that assures the automatic functioning of power." The power that comes from being able to constantly watch someone at all times is very effective. Knowing you are being watched does change the way you would act and places a certain kind of fear in you. In the cases of inmates, it installs a fear that discourages them from even attempting to escape. It is the personal and private level that the Panopticon functions on that it is able to be successful in watching all and having the power to control the minds of those being watched at all times, even when they are not actually being watched that very second.