Resistance as the Discourse of Docile Bodies in Plath\'s The Bell Jar

Abstract

In his book Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison, Michel Foucault argues that the bodyis the object and target in power relations, and the purpose is to discipline the body in order to ensure thecontinuity of society. Thus he suggests that individuals are under surveillance and regulations that are mostoften subtle, and that by means of those regulations modern institutions individuate bodies according todesignated tasks so as to create socially docile and profitable individuals. Therefore, disciplinary methodsthat are employed in schools, hospitals, armies, homes as well as prisons and mental institutions, are thetools of the collective forces aiming to “obtain an efficient machine”(164), through habituating the internalization of surveillance. Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar, published in 1963 but written during the late 1950s,lends itself to a Foucauldian analysis of bodies that enter into the machinery of power that ‘explores [thebody], breaks it down and rearranges it’ (Discipline and Punish 138). The reason for this inclination is thatthe postwar system that Plath critiques, like Foucault’s disciplinary institutions, also requires knowledgeof the system that is invisible. Plath’s novel revolves around this theoretical framework with the aim ofpresenting how an individual suffocates under the pressure of disciplining regulations. This article, thus,aims to present the novel as an examination of the ways in which an individual attempts to change thepower relations, negotiate with disciplining forces and the limitations of this strategy

Keywords

• body, power, gender roles, social institutions, resistance, silence

Resistance as the Discourse of Docile Bodies in Plath\'s The Bell Jar

Abstract

Michel Foucault Disiplin ve Ceza adlı kitabında, iktidar iliflkileri içinde bedenlerin en önemli odak noktası oldu¤unu ve iktidarın devamlılık sa¤layabilmek için bireysel bedenleri disiplin teknikleri kullana- rak belirli bir norma uyumlu hale getirdi¤ini anlatıyor. Foucault’ya göre gözetim ve kontrol, itaatkâr ve “faydalı” bedenler yaratmayı hedefleyen bu disipliner teknikler arasındadır. Okullarda, hastanelerde, aske- riyede, hapishane ve akıl hastanelerinde ve hatta evlerde uygulanan disiplin mekanizmalarının asıl amacı iktidarın kontrolünü içsellefltirmifl bedenler, etkin makineler yaratmaktır. Sylvia Plath’ın 1950’lerde yazdı- ¤ı fakat ancak 1963’te yayımlanan Sırça Fanus adlı kitabı Foucault’un bahsetti¤i itaatkar bedenlerin olu- flum sürecinin hikayesi olarak yorumlanabilir. Romanın bu biçimde yorumlanmasının bafllıca sebebi Plath’ın elefltirdi¤i savafl sonrası sistemin Foucault’un anlattı¤ı disipliner sistemle benzerlik göstermesidir; iki yazarın da üstünde durdu¤u nokta bu sistemin görünmez oldu¤u, bu sebeple kolay ifllemesi ve bu me- kanizmanın bir parçası olabilmek için belirli bir tür bilgiye ihtiyaç duyuluyor olmasıdır. Plath’ın romanı- nın asıl amacı bireyin bu disiplin mekanizması altında nasıl bo¤uldu¤unu göstermektir. Dolayısıyla bu ma- kale romanda bireyin sözü edilen iktidar iliflkilerini de¤ifltirme ve bu sistemle uzlaflma çabalarını, bu stra- tejinin sınırlılı¤ını gösterecektir

Keywords

• ANAHTAR KEL‹MELERbeden, iktidar, cinsiyet rolleri, sosyal kurumlar, direnç, sessizlik

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