Task 1.

The idea of the panopticon model as a metaphor for a system of discipline is still very much present in contemporary culture; we are constantly self regulating for the chance that we might be being watched, a highly evident example of this is CCTV cameras. A more discreet example of this in modern society is computer accounts at this college; students of the college all have a 'segmented, immobile, frozen space' (Foucault, 2000 p 76) in the form of their login that is individual to them, so no matter where they are in college, they are using their account and the computer technicians can allows see what they’re doing; 'The gaze is alert everywhere.' (Foucault, 2000 p 76).

'This enclosed, segmented space, observed at every point, in which the individuals are inserted in a fixed place…in which all events are recorded.' (Foucault, 2000 p 77-78) The emphasis of this quotation is on the ‘all events are recorded’; no matter when students logon to the computers or where they are in the college, the technicians can track every website they have been on since their account existed and even how many key strokes the individual has done in one session; the technicians can even take over your computer while you’re working on it so that you no longer have control.

To make sure that students are always aware they may be being watched, there is a small icon in the top right hand corner of the computer screen, it doesn’t say anything when you click on it and it doesn’t warn you when the staff are looking at your account, it is just a symbol of institutional power, a pair of binoculars to make us anxious, as Foucault states in his theory of panopticism; ‘Unverifiable: the inmate must never know whether he is being looked at at any one moment; but he must be sure that he may always be so.’ (Foucault, 2000 p 82)

‘He is seen, but he does not see; he is the object of information, never a subject of communication.’ (Foucault, 2000 p 80).

Bibliography:
'Panopticism' in Thomas, J. (2000), Reading Images, NY, Palgrave McMillan