Lecture Four: Panopticism - Institutions and Institutional Power

I found today's lecture to be very interesting, as panopticism is a concept that I haven't really heard of/thought about before and it was fascinating to realise just how much it occurs in today's society.

Lecture Notes

The lecture started by outlining The Great Confinement that occurred in the late 1600s. Individuals were judged on how useful they were and how much of a role they had in society and if they were deemed useless they were locked away in 'Houses of Correction' were they were made to work, and would be beaten if they didn't. These houses were usually filled with homeless people, criminals and the unemployed. This lead to the birth of the Asylum, where individuals were made useful for society.

This is where Foucault comes into play. Michel Foucault (1926-1984) wanted to legitimise the practices of hospitals and Doctors. He saw asylums and prisons to affect human beings in a way that altered their consciousness and internalised our responsibility and that rationalising institutions teach us to control our behaviours (to self regulate).

Panopticon Design

Jeremy Bentham proposed the design of a building called the Panopticon in 1791. Though none were built during his own time, the Panopticon was designed so that the individuals/inmates would be situated in their own cubicles or sections that lined the outside wall. They would not be able to see anybody else in other sections, but instead could look forward at 'the face of the institution', whether this be a prison guard, a doctor, a teacher. It took the common idea of a dungeon where prisoners would be locked away in the darkness and out of sight, and did the exact opposite; the inmates would be on show and would be monitored by the observation tower that was in the middle of the Panopticon.
The idea was that you would change your behaviour as you would always be watched, meaning you would be spotted if you acted out of line and potentially punished for it. The inmate would be induced to a state of conscious and permanent visibility that would assure the automatic functioning of power.

Foucault believed this to be a metaphor for society, and how we are always being watched by those in power or with authority. He stated that "the Panopticon is a model of how modern society organises its knowledge, its power, its surveillance of bodies, its training of bodies". To begin with I didn't fully understand where he was coming from, and it was only until we looked at how Panopticism occurs in today's times that I could see his point. Panopticon is everywhere in today's society. Open plan offices is a good example of this as creating this open space without cubicles can increase productivity as you are too scared to waste time and slack off as you will be caught. But then it also occurs in places were you aren't even expected to work, but to behave, for example in bars. In traditional pubs it was common to have booths that were tucked away so you could have privacy, but it is becoming more popular for the bar to be more open plan with the bar being the centre of the space, encouraging you to behave differently even if you aren't even being watched by the bar staff. Almost all public spaces are monitored by CCTV now too, and yes this may be for security reasons, but when the cameras are visible it is more likely than not that we will behave differently when in the presence of them because we know we are being watched, whether we are or not.
This greatly backs up Foucault's point, especially as in the Panopticon's observation tower there wasn't always a guard on duty. The inmates would not have been aware of this fact as the blinds would be drawn on the windows, but just the presence of the tower alone and the idea that there might be someone of power in there was enough to change their behaviour and 'correct them'.

Now initially I don't see how this relates directly to animation, but it definitely influences my practice and my studies. There is even an trace of panopticism in the lectures I attend. The lecturer is not forcing me to attend or to listen - I generally go because I'm interested in what there is to be said - but instead it is ourselves that are conformed, even the space and the layout of the lecture hall encourages us to watch.

Lecture Three: Identity

In today's lecture we considered the historical conceptions of identity and how identity is viewed today, especially in the digital domain. We started by looking at the different phases of identity, these being Pre-modern, Modern and Post-modern. Pre-modern conceptions suggest that personal identity is stable and is defined by long standing roles, for example marriage, the church, work ete, whereas modern and post-modern views suggest that you are able to choose your identity and that it is constructed out of the discourses that are available to you.

Lecture Notes

We also looked briefly into Physiognomy and how this relates to identity. Physiognomy is the assessment of someone's personality or character based on their appearence, most commonly the face. This practice was accepted by ancient Greek philosophers but was revived and popularised by Johann Kaspar Lavater from 1775. He introduced the idea that this related to specific character traits rather than general types. Similarly Cesare Lombroso proposed the theory of positivist/anthropological criminology which states that criminal tendancies can be inherited, and that "born criminals" can be identified by physical defects and characteristics.

This can relate strongly to stereotyping. A great example of this is Tracey Emin's "Everyone I Have Ever Slept With (1963-1995)". The piece was a tent that was lined with appliqued names of everyone she had ever slept with, and it is often misinterpreted as being a euphemism where the tent is indicating all of her sexual partners. At a first glance many would shame her for sleeping around as they would judge the piece on it's face value before taking a look inside and finding out what the work is actually about. Only a select few of the names mentioned in the tent she has sexual relations with, the rest are a collection of family and friends, merely people she has SHARED a bed with and slept alongside.

Tracey Emin - Everyone I Have Ever Slept With

I think these points are commonly addressed when it comes to character design in Animation. Designers *sometimes* tend to play on stereotypes when designing characters. For example, intelligent characters tend to have similar characteristics, for instance they will be depicted with large heads and faces that are very "straight" whereas "dumb" characters tend to be the opposite. They will be depicted with faces that tend to slant back, and have more asymmetric features. A good example of this is Pinky and the Brain. The two characters are laboratory mice who live in a cage in a research facility. Brain is constantly trying to take over the world, thought his plans fall through due to Pinky's idiocy (usually)

Pinky (Left) and the Brain (Right)

This example is clearly playing n stereotypes. The clever character has a large head and is generally quite stern looking, where as the "idiot" looks goofy and feeble-minded.