Fuko For Dummies Or A Critique Of Society And Education In America At The Turn Of The Millenium Applying The Philosophy Of Michel Foucalt Term paper

While the free essays can give you inspiration for writing, they cannot be used 'as is' because they will not meet your assignment's requirements. If you are in a time crunch, then you need a custom written term paper on your subject (fuko for dummies or a critique of society and education in america at the turn of the millenium applying the philosophy of michel foucalt)
Here you can hire an independent writer/researcher to custom write you an authentic essay to your specifications that will pass any plagiarism test (e.g. Turnitin). Waste no more time!

A Critique of Society and Education in America at the Turn of the Millennium Applying the Philosophy of Michel Foucault

aka

FUKO for Dummies

As Foucault began, so shall I:

This is not a pipe.

This is a convenient illustration for the basic tenant of Foucault s philosophy, Discourse creates truth. What this means is that there is nothing inherent about a pipe which makes it a pipe. Society as we know it creates labels for all sorts of things, and when those labels enter our common discourse, they are accepted as truth, or knowledge. If everyone stopped referring to the above as a pipe, it would stop being a pipe.

Unfortunately, the same is true for people. If Paco is labeled a jerk, when he is indeed not a jerk, and it passes into common discourse that Paco is a jerk, then this will become true. People will look at him differently now that he is a jerk, they will act differently, and most importantly he will become a jerk, because of how he acts and thinks of himself. This creation of truth which turned average Paco into a jerk is a very significant process, by which society derives its power over the individuals in the society, in this case Paco. By controlling the original discourse, therefore, one derives power.

Now that it has been established that control of discourse creates power-knowledge spheres, or relationships, then one can see how this applies to our present day society, and educational system. Our society and its most obvious expression, the government, wish to perpetuate themselves, together with their values and power. To do this, they (society and government) use the afore outlined method of achieving power.

For example, one of our society s declared values is democracy. When a member of our society thinks of democracy, favorable impressions come to mind, such as those of American revolutionaries or brave soldiers fighting the evil forces of somebody, such as Nazis or independence minded North Vietnamese. The idea that all these good things symbolize democracy has become knowledge through discourse. Therefore, why would we question our own democratic government, or feel anything but patriotism toward it? By creating this truth, it should be quite apparent how this is a form of power that our society has over the individuals. The argument here is not that democracy is necessarily bad; that is for another essay to prove or disprove; this argument is about how we come to think of democracy and our government which is a democracy as good. Also, this can be applied to almost every other value our culture holds, e.g. religious tolerance, constitutionalism, individual freedoms, capitalism, financial success, technological and industrial development, etc.

One of the most important forums of discourse, and so power-knowledge sphere creation, is our school system. Society tells us that one should not try to learn independently, i.e. outside of school. This would make you un-cool or show preoccupation with academics, or some other negative label. Thus, the primary source where we learn about most values and ideologies is school. (Of course all teachers and schools pay lip-service to independent thought or outside learning, although few seriously believe that children really will learn or more importantly inculcate themselves this way.) Control of public and private schools is relatively easy. Public school children...

You should cite this paper as follows:

MLA Style
. EssayMania.com. Retrieved on 25 May, 2012 from
    <http://essaymania.com/116499/fuko-for-dummies-or-a-critique-of-society-and-education-in-america-at-the-turn-of-the-millenium-applying-the-philosophy-of-michel-foucalt>

More College Papers

Expansions Of Rhada And Krishna essay
Expansions of Rhada and Krishna. In India the Goddess is known by such names as Durga, Kali, Lakshmi, among many others. She is the goddess of the material world, her jurisdiction given to her by Lord Krishna. She is the ruler of the fourth level of existence, known as the Devidharma, where th

Fe essay
Hills Like White Elephants The most striking feature of this short story is the way in which it is told. It is not a story in the classical sense with an introduction, a development of the story and an end, but we just get some time in the life of two people, as if it were just a piece of a film wh

Existentialism And Theatre- essay
Existentialism and Theatre- Existentialism is a concept that became popular during the second World War in France, and just after it. French playrights have often used the stage to express their views, and these views came to surface even during a Nazi occupation. Bernard Shaw got his play