Class Room: Founders College Room 110

GS/SPTH 6664 3.00 Docile Body: Postmodern Thought on Power and Body

Class Room: Founders College Room 110

WINTER 2010: Thursdays: 11:30 - 2:30 p.m.

Professor Indhu Rajagopal
229 Founders College
e-mail

Office Hours: Thursdays (after class, by appointment)
Course Webpage: www.yorku.ca/rajagopa

Course Outline:

Michel Foucault’s works on disciplinary body practices and on sexuality in his two books of 1975 and 1976, Discipline and Punish, and The History of Sexuality, volume 1, and his lectures courses given during the period subsequent to these books expand on the notion of “biopower”. These works explain the link between bio-politics and 19th century liberalism. We will explore these works on discipline and sexuality, and examine these ideas as applied to the body in the contemporary contexts of surveillance, life, death, reproduction and ethics.

We will read Michel Foucault’s works on the body (Discipline and Punish and The History of Sexuality v.1). As he sees the body as being entangled in the web of power that works through discourses, institutions, and other cultural practices, his genealogical explorations uncover the processes of hegemonic societal power. Foucault’s ‘Power’ oppresses and manipulates human bodies to become subjected and practised bodies, and the exercise of power is through a calculated policy and action of coercions and surveillance of the body. This exertion of power on the body “breaks it down and rearranges it…Thus, discipline produces subjected and practiced bodies, ‘docile’ bodies” that are the locus and condition of subjectivity.

Gilles Deleuze extends our discussion on "Docile Bodies", as he compares the human body in contemporary society with that of Foucault’s eighteenth century model. Deleuze (selections from Anti Oedipus and A Thousand Plateaus) examines all ‘dominant and dominated forces’ as relationships that constitute a body: chemical, biological, social, or political. Diverging from Foucault, he argues that the system of power and control in society is more fluid than ‘disciplinary.’ Why and how do the two power paradigms – Foucault’s and Deleuze’s – differ while they both agree on the premise that objectification of the body through dehumanization results in ‘Docile Bodies’?

Course Readings:

Required readings:

Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish

------, History of Sexuality, volume 1

Selections from:

Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, Anti-Oedipus

……….. , A Thousand Plateaus

Books can be ordered as "used books” through various websites. Articles listed in the reading list are accessible through e-resources in York libraries.

If you let me know ahead of time, books/ texts that you may use for your presentations could also be placed on reserve for short periods of time. These readings may be useful for those students who will be writing Ripostes on your presentations. You should select such readings that may give more perspective, context, and history on your topic.
Course Assignments and Grade breakdown:

· Attendance and participation (20%)

· 2 x 15 minute individual presentations (20%)

· Riposte Folder (2 responses for others’ presentation) (10%)

· Final Essay (50% = 10%: Topic, Rough bibliography, draft of a thesis & framework + 40% for Final Essay & List of References used (to be uploaded to Turnitin).

Attendance & Participation

"Attendance and participation" mean good preparation of weekly assigned readings and their exposition in each class. Sign up for your presentations, and be prepared to address/ask questions in the class. If no questions are raised, be ready to heed to my request to explain the reading in your own words. Clearly focused questions are important in this course, as we deal with discursive topics. You may bring in a media resource from the web or in printed sources, and explain why and how it relates to the weekly readings.

A presentation requires a theoretical focus and a conceptual framework that will form the backbone of your arguments and analysis. You need to choose an original source - writings of Foucault and Deleuze & Guttari - and explain their ideas in your own words, and show how they link to your arguments. Useful for this exercise are the key terms, concepts, arguments of these thinkers discussed in class. Your originality, organization, brevity and clarity will serve as grading criteria (that will be posted on our course webpage).

A “Riposte Folder" will contain all your summaries (each, approx. 150 words/ ¾ of a page) of the substantive arguments in other students’ class presentations. This riposte will also include a critical question to the presenter. You will write 2 riposte for 2 students’ presentations. Each of you needs to choose one presentation that falls before and another, after Reading week. Please send a copy to me and to the presenter involved.

For the final essay, you will have to hand in 4 pieces of work by the deadlines:

1. Title or topic of your proposed essay

2. An annotated bibliography

3. A thesis and a framework of analysis

4. Final essay

Logistics & Governmentalities:

I would like you to follow deadlines as this will help you plan your work/essay ahead of time. Riposte notes need to be sent right after a presentation as otherwise they may not be useful for the presenter to address your questions/ provide explanations to your response.

Course Objectives:

All readings are selected both from original works and from secondary sources that may illustrate conceptual frameworks developed by other writers using these original works.

January 7, 2010 Introduction:

Jan 14 Discipline and Punish DP: 3-169

Recommended Readings: Bio-Politics & Liberalism

Klimoski, R., & Palmer S. (1993). The ADA and the hiring process in organizations.
Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research, 45(2), 10-36.

Amsden, Brian (2008). Negotiating Liberalism and Bio-Politics: Stylizing Power in Defense of the Mall Curfew. Quarterly Journal of Speech, 94 (4), 407-429.

Parry, John T. “Society Must Be [Regulated]”: Biopolitics and The Commerce Clause in Gonzales V. Raich. http://legacy.lclark.edu/org/lclr/objects/LCB94_Parry.pdf (accessed Dec 5, 09)

Jan 21 Discipline and Punish DP: 170-308

Recommended Readings: Biopower, Death & Reproduction

Rose, Nikolas (2001). The Politics of Life Itself. Theory, Culture & Society, 18(6), 1–30.

McDorman, Todd F. (2005). Controlling Death: Bio-Power and the Right-to-Die Controversy, Communication and Critical/Cultural Studies, 2 (3), 257-279.

Prado, C. G. (2003) Foucauldian Ethics and Elective Death, Journal of Medical Humanities, 24( 3/4), 203-211.

Coors, Marilyn E. (2003). A Foucauldian Foray Into The New Genetics, Journal of Medical Humanities, 24 (3/4), 279-289.

Pollock, Anne (2003). Complicating Power in High-Tech Reproduction: Narratives of Anonymous Paid Egg Donors, Journal of Medical Humanities, 24 (3/4), 241-263.

Jan 28 History of Sexuality vol. 1 HS: 1-73

Recommended Readings: Bioethics & Care of the Self

Frank, Arthur W and Jones, Therese (2003). Bioethics and the Later Foucault, Journal of Medical Humanities, 24 (3/4), 179-186.

Chambon, Adrienne S. and Irving, Allan (2003). “They Give Reason a Responsibility Which It Simply Can’t Bear”: Ethics, Care of the Self, and Caring Knowledge, Journal of Medical Humanities, Vol. 24 (3/4), 265-178.

Redmond, Sean(2008) 'Pieces of Me’: Celebrity Confessional Carnality, Social Semiotics, 18: 2, 149-161.

Feb 4 History of Sexuality vol. 1 HS: 77-159

Recommended Readings: Sex, Disciplining & Plasticity

Nicholas de Villiers (2007). How Much Does It Cost for Cinema to Tell the Truth of Sex? Cinéma Vérité and Sexography. Sexualities, 10(3): 341–361.

Heyes, Cressida J. (2007). Cosmetic Surgery And The Televisual Makeover A Foucauldian Feminist Reading, Feminist Media Studies, 7 (1),

Poster, Mark (2007). Swan’s Way: Care of Self in the Hyperreal, Configurations, 15:151–175

Shugart, Helene A (2006). Ruling Class: Disciplining Class, Race, and Ethnicity in Television Reality Court Shows. The Howard Journal of Communications, 17, 79-100

Blackman, Lisa (2004). Self-help Media Cultures and the production of Female Psychopathology, European Journal of Cultural Studies, 7 (2):219-236. www.sagepublications.com

Pippa Brush (1998). Metaphors of Inscription: Discipline, Plasticity and the Rhetoric of Choice Feminist Review, No. 58, International Voices (Spring, 1998), pp. 22-43 http://www.jstor.org.

John W. Jordan (2004). The Rhetorical Limits of the “Plastic Body”, Quarterly Journal of Speech Vol. 90, No. 3, August 2004, pp. 327–358.

Feb 11

Required Readings: Protevi:

Protevi, John (2008). Deleuze. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/deleuze/

Protevi, John (2008) Philosophy of Consciousness and The Body (draft). http://www.protevi.com/john Accessed Mar 09

Protevi, John (2009). The Terri Schiavo Case Empathy, Love, Sacrifice, Singularity. Protevi’s Talk. http://www.protevi.com/john Accessed Mar 09

Protevi, John (1999). Philosophical Significance of Complexity Theory. http://www.protevi.com/john/DG/PDF/Remarks_on_Complexity_Theory.pdf

Protevi, John (2008). 3 Lectures on "Deleuze and Biology". http://www.protevi.com/john Accessed Mar 09

Feb 15-19 Reading Week No Classes.

Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari (1983). Anti-Oedipus (AO)

Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari (1987) A Thousand Plateaus. (ATP)

Feb 25 Anti-Oedipus (AO), part 1

Recommended Readings: Body and Assemblages

Coleman, Rebecca (2008). The Becoming Of Bodies: Girls, Media Effects, and Body Image Feminist Media Studies, 8 (2), 163-179

Malins, Peta (2004). Body-Space Assemblages and Folds: Theorizing the Relationship between

Injecting Drug User Bodies and Urban Space, Continuum: Journal of Media & Cultural Studies 18 (4), 483-495.

March 4 AO, part 3

Deleuze and Felix Guattari (1987), A Thousand Plateaus, trans. Brian Massumi (Minneapolis, University of Minnesota Press.

March 11 AO, part 3