Thursday, November 23, 2006
It's interesting that the readings from this week talk about biopolitics & control, because we also talked about ideas of control (albeit in a different way) in my Nutritional Anthropology class on Tuesday. But I will get into this later.
Lazzarato cites Foucault as saying that we should "speak of power relations rather than power alone, because the emphasis should fall upon the relation itself rather than on its terms". I agree with this statement because although it does seem as if the dominant is overpowering the submissive in general ideas of power, this is not the case. There is somewhat of a dynamic that exists between the 2 parties. The dominant is controlling the submissive, but it must beware of possibilities that the submissive may resist. The dominant must also have certain qualities to be able to assert whatever power that they have. I guess these could include a legitimate threat, informational power, or superficial qualities such as appearance. In my Applied Social Psychology class, we talked about such characteristics as being determinants of whether people will conform to norms, or be persuaded by various advertisements. One could say that advertisements are a way for the government to covertly "control" us, because advertisements always contain subliminal messages.
This concept of institutions inadvertently controlling us is what we talked about in Nutritional Anthropology. One of the readings written by Marjorie DeVault, talked about Japanese obentos (intricately designed lunchboxes) and how their preparation situates the obento producer as a woman and a mother, and the consumer as the child. The Japanese nursery school is seen as a primary "ideological state apparatus" (an institution whose role is not political or administrative, but that still manages to influence us). It makes people see the world a certain way, and to accept certain identities. In this case, although it has less to do with technology, the mother and child are put into their respective positions due to the covert influence of the education system. The idea of power relations can be discussed here too, because what's interesting about this dynamic is that although the mother is placed into this position, it is not an unenjoyable one. She takes pleasure from preparing these lunchboxes for the child, as they are the way for the Japanese mother to express her identity and commitment through her food. So, a person's autonomy is not completely lost through this wielding of power, although they are ultimately still restricted by these rules.
The other reading we focused on this week was Sloterdijk's chapters from "Critique of Cynical Reason". What I found interesting was a reference that he makes in the chapter on artificial limbs. He mentions that in some textbooks, "a highly apposite image of the human being emerges: Homo prostheticus". Is this idea of a new species of human being a relative of the cyborg? Perhaps, since he is part machine and part organism. I actually plan to talk about transhumanism in my research paper, and this passage sort of touches on this matter. The fact that some textbooks and writings give humans with prosthetic limbs a whole new name implies that they are post-human beings.
On the topic of biopower & biopolitics, it might be interesting to bring up the issue of cancer drugs not being available to everyone in Canada. "Government red tape" apparently has strict rules about who gets the drugs and who doesn't, which is incredibly unfair in a situation that may be a matter of life and death for the cancer patient. An article about this issue can be read here. Another example of power over drugs is the Ontario Drug Benefit Formulary, which can be read about here.
Lazzarato cites Foucault as saying that we should "speak of power relations rather than power alone, because the emphasis should fall upon the relation itself rather than on its terms". I agree with this statement because although it does seem as if the dominant is overpowering the submissive in general ideas of power, this is not the case. There is somewhat of a dynamic that exists between the 2 parties. The dominant is controlling the submissive, but it must beware of possibilities that the submissive may resist. The dominant must also have certain qualities to be able to assert whatever power that they have. I guess these could include a legitimate threat, informational power, or superficial qualities such as appearance. In my Applied Social Psychology class, we talked about such characteristics as being determinants of whether people will conform to norms, or be persuaded by various advertisements. One could say that advertisements are a way for the government to covertly "control" us, because advertisements always contain subliminal messages.
This concept of institutions inadvertently controlling us is what we talked about in Nutritional Anthropology. One of the readings written by Marjorie DeVault, talked about Japanese obentos (intricately designed lunchboxes) and how their preparation situates the obento producer as a woman and a mother, and the consumer as the child. The Japanese nursery school is seen as a primary "ideological state apparatus" (an institution whose role is not political or administrative, but that still manages to influence us). It makes people see the world a certain way, and to accept certain identities. In this case, although it has less to do with technology, the mother and child are put into their respective positions due to the covert influence of the education system. The idea of power relations can be discussed here too, because what's interesting about this dynamic is that although the mother is placed into this position, it is not an unenjoyable one. She takes pleasure from preparing these lunchboxes for the child, as they are the way for the Japanese mother to express her identity and commitment through her food. So, a person's autonomy is not completely lost through this wielding of power, although they are ultimately still restricted by these rules.
The other reading we focused on this week was Sloterdijk's chapters from "Critique of Cynical Reason". What I found interesting was a reference that he makes in the chapter on artificial limbs. He mentions that in some textbooks, "a highly apposite image of the human being emerges: Homo prostheticus". Is this idea of a new species of human being a relative of the cyborg? Perhaps, since he is part machine and part organism. I actually plan to talk about transhumanism in my research paper, and this passage sort of touches on this matter. The fact that some textbooks and writings give humans with prosthetic limbs a whole new name implies that they are post-human beings.
On the topic of biopower & biopolitics, it might be interesting to bring up the issue of cancer drugs not being available to everyone in Canada. "Government red tape" apparently has strict rules about who gets the drugs and who doesn't, which is incredibly unfair in a situation that may be a matter of life and death for the cancer patient. An article about this issue can be read here. Another example of power over drugs is the Ontario Drug Benefit Formulary, which can be read about here.
# posted by Bonnie @ York : 5:37 PM
