Permanent observation of bodies simultaneously produces knowledge of the individual and subjection

Evidence

The chiefs and their deputies at Mettray had to be not exactly judges, or teachers, or foremen, or non-commissioned officers, or ‘parents’, but something of all these things in a quite specific mode of intervention. They were in a sense technicians of behaviour: engineers of conduct, orthopaedists of individuality. Their task was to produce bodies that were both docile and capable; they supervised the nine or ten working hours of every day (whether in a workshop or in the fields); they directed the orderly movements of groups of inmates, physical exercises, military exercises, rising in the morning, going to bed at night, walks to the accompaniment of bugle and whistle; they taught gymnastics; they checked cleanliness, supervised bathing. Training was accompanied by permanent observation; a body of knowledge was being constantly built up from the everyday behaviour of the inmates; it was organized as an instrument of perpetual assessment: ‘On entering the colony, the child is subjected to a sort of interrogation as to his origins, the position of his family, the offence for which he was brought before the courts and all the other offences that make up his short and often very sad existence. This information is written down on a board on which everything concerning each inmate is noted in turn, his stay at the colony and the place to which he is sent when he leaves’ (Ducpétiaux, 1851, 61). The modelling of the body produces a knowledge of the individual, the apprenticeship of the techniques induces modes of behaviour and the acquisition of skills is inextricably linked with the establishment of power relations; strong, skilled agricultural workers are produced; in this very work, provided it is technically supervised, submissive subjects are produced and a dependable body of knowledge built up about them. This disciplinary technique exercised upon the body had a double effect: a ‘soul’ to be known and a subjection to be maintained. — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 450

Categorization

• XREF: The board recording ‘everything concerning each inmate’ — origins, offences, fate on release — is the dossier system, anticipating the telescreen-fed records of Orwell’s Oceania and connecting to the reader’s Foucault-for-1984 thesis. — connects to: The table functioned simultaneously as an instrument of power and of knowledge — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 228; Examinations normalize subjects and differentiate their abilities simultaneously — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 240; The examination is a normalizing gaze that classifies and punishes through visibility — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 284 (+6 more)
• DEFINE: Foucault’s core formula ‘a soul to be known and a subjection to be maintained’ is the precise mechanism the reader wants to test against Bentham/Foucault’s panoptic definition.
• DEEPTHINKING: The body’s modeling producing both a knowable soul and maintained subjection — one disciplinary operation yielding both knowledge and power — is among the densest formulations in the chapter.

Related

• The tableau form lets total knowledge be surveyed at a single glance (similarity 0.88)
• Human sciences were conveyed by a bodily discipline that fused subjection with objectification. (similarity 0.82)

Broader Connections

• Human sciences were conveyed by a bodily discipline that fused subjection with objectification. #corroborates (0.85) — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 465