Paper (from previous post)

     In this paper I will examine the way that Michel Foucault's theory of the will to knowlege mediates the construction of a postmodern identity within consumer culture. To do this I will apply the differentiation made by Douglas Kellner between the modern identity and the post modern identity to the theory of "the society of the spectacle" proposed by Guy Debord. I will also examine the role that imagery created by consumer culture plays in construction of identity and the need that individuals have for tools to mediate the kinds of imagery they consume.
      Within the first volume of Foucault's The History of Sexuality, one encounters three salient theories which Foucault develops over the course of the text. The first theory that Foucault forwards is that the repressive hypothesis - the assertion that since the 19th century western societies have sought to repress human sexuality and sexual urges - is false. In its place, Foucault offers that "... Rather than massive censorship... what was involved was a regulated and polymorphous incitement to discourse." (Foucault, 34).
      In problematizing the repressive hypothesis Foucault questions the relevance that sexuality plays in the formation of ones personal identity. "...There emerged a completely new technology of sex... Through pedagogy, medicine, and economics, it made sex not only a secular concern but a concern of the state as well; to be more exact, sex became a matter that required the social body as a whole, and virtually all of its individuals, to place themselves under constant surveillance" (Foucault, 116).
      This recognition of how social institutions regard sex reveals the constructed nature of sexuality. Rather than ones identity being derived from the sexual self, Foucault forwards that identity and sexuality are both social constructions. The nuanced relationship that they have with each-other is not hierarchical, but give and take. This redefining of sexuality's role in the formation of ones identity also problematizes "identity" itself. If - as Foucault suggests - ones identity is not ones sexual self, what then does identity consist of?
      This is a question that Douglas Kellner addresses in his text Media Culture. "...Identity has been increasingly linked to style, to produce an image, to how one looks. It is as if everyone must have their own look, style, and image to have their own identity, though, paradoxically, many of the models of style and look come from consumer culture, thus individuality is highly mediated in the consumer society of the present..." (Kellner, 233).
      Kellner's assertion that identity is linked to look, style, and image fits with Foucault's belief that the creation of identity draws from numerous sources. Like sexuality, image is both an input that forms identity as well as an output of identity. The salient point found in Kellner's thought is the role that images from consumer culture play in creation of identity. However, this point raises several more questions, specifically, where do images of identity within consumer culture originate? And, what is consumer culture?
      Foucault has already answered the first question in his debunking of the repressive hypothesis. When he described a "polymorphous incitement to discourse," Foucault was referring to the way individuals within consumer culture willingly submit the intimate details of their lives to social institutions of power. "... Sociology, applied psychology, cybernetics, and semiology [etc.]," (Debord, 42) these institutions within consumer culture ingest information from individuals and output data, text, and images.
      The second question - what is consumer culture? - is addressed by Guy Debord in his text The Society of the Spectacle. "...The world at once present and absent that the spectacle holds up to view is the world of the commodity dominating all living experience. The world of the commodity is thus shown for what it is, because its development is identical to people’s estrangement from each other and from everything they produce."
      Debord is saying that "the society of the spectacle" is a culture of consumers living within the economic system of global, late capitalism. He is also describing the world in which we live today; a world in which the value of a quality or quantity is proportional to its potential to exist as a commodity. In this society, identity - like everything else - has been commodified. Kellner describes the process of this commodification when he makes the distinction between the idea of the modern identity, "...An innate essence which determines what I am..." and postmodern identity, "...that identity is constructed not given, that it is a matter of choice, style, and behavior rather than intrinsic moral or psychological qualities... ...Postmodern identity, then, is constituted theatrically through role playing and image construction..." (Kellner, 242).
      These two forms of identity fit within the society of the spectacle in an interesting way. If - as Debord believes - the spectacle constitutes the entire culture in which we live - and our identities are informed by roles and images we consume from culture - then the idea that one can "just be" (possess a modern identity) is false. Within consumer culture the modern identity only exists as a form of ignorance to the fact that every identity is postmodern. To clarify, the postmodern identity is an image or role that one constructs and performs. It is based on images and images of roles that one consumes from culture. The institutions of consumer culture produces images based on input from individuals. This output is consumed by individuals and used in the creation of identities. Individuals (possessing identities) then submit more information to the institutions of consumer culture and the cycle repeats. The nature of the postmodern identity is intimately linked to image, specifically images produced by consumer culture. This begs the question; what do the images of consumer culture look like?
      Jonathan Crary addresses this concern in his text Techniques of the Observer, "... the historically important functions of the human eye are being supplanted by practices in which visual images no longer have any reference to the position of an observer in a 'real,' optically perceived world..." (Crary, 2).
      Crary is describing the form that images produced by consumer culture now almost exclusively take. He is specifically referring to the creation of digitally manipulated imagery and entirely digital images and environments. The proliferation of these sorts of images within consumer culture is of great concern to Crary because they present themselves as reality, when in fact they have never - and in many cases could never - actually exist.
      Non-real imagery of the sort described by Crary is given a name by Jean Baudrillard in his text Simulacra and Simulation, "...Today's abstraction is no longer that of the map, the double, the mirror, or the concept. Simulation is no longer that of a territory, a referential being, or a substance. It is the generation by models of a real without origin or reality: a hyperreal. The territory no longer precedes the map, nor does it survive it. It is nevertheless the map that preceded the territory - precession of simulacra..." (Baudrillard, 2).
      Baudrillard and Crary are both concerned with the quality of image that is being produced by consumer culture. They both believe that the digital imagery consumed by individuals through advertising, the internet, film, and television are overwhelmingly hyper-real in nature. The question that is found within the subtext of their concern can be explicitly stated as, "If the imagery produced by consumer culture is overwhelmingly hyper-real (simulacra) - and individuals construct identities from images taken from culture - are those identities simulacra as well?"
      The relevance of this question is addressed in the second theory - the concept of biopower - presented by Foucault within The History of Sexuality, "... An explosion of numerous and diverse techniques for achieving the subjugations of bodies and the control of populations..." (Foucault, 140).
      This reification of groups of people into "populations" is a technique of consumer culture that is enabled by the creation of simulacrum identities. The knowledge that this system of control exists is an aspect of Foucault's third theory, the will to knowlege.
      The will to knowledge in essence is the will to power; but instead of taking power by force, or by "right", one obtains power through knowledge. In the case of consumer culture, power is obtained over populations through the same input of information and output of imagery that turns identity into simulacrum. Conversely, individuals within a population may gain power over consumer culture through the knowledge that this process is occurring. Knowledge of this process also gives individuals power to consume images that are not products of consumer culture.
      What does imagery that is not a part of consumer culture look like? In a visual culture of television, cinema, and the internet how does one discern if the media one is consuming is authentic - not hyperreal - in its production? One example of modern film production that attempts to address this concern is the Dogme 95 movement created by directors Lars von Trier and Thomas Vinterberg in the mid 1990's (wikipedia.org). Von Trier and Vinterberg laid out a declaration and a set of guidelines to aid filmmakers attempting to create a new type of film that could not be effected by the production values of consumer culture. "...Today a technological storm is raging of which the result is the elevation of cosmetics to God. By using new technology anyone at any time can wash the last grains of truth away in the deadly embrace of sensation. The illusions are everything the movie can hide behind. Dogme 95 counters the film of illusion by the presentation of an indisputable set of rules known as The Vow of Chastity..."
      The "elevation of cosmetics to God" that the Dogme movement attempts to circumvent is synonymous with Baudrillard's description of the hyperreal. The "Vow of Chastity" that filmmakers working in the Dogme 95 style take are ten guidelines that von Trier and Vinterberg believe are necessary for the creation of films that owe no debts to the production values of consumer imagery. The rules of this style of film production are useful in attempting to create new films, but also can serve as a makeshift measuring stick for texts that already exist. This is not the intended purpose of the Dogme 95 movement, but in making such a comparison one can observe the sort of films that von Trier and Vinterberg are trying not to make.
      The most popular movie of 1994 - the year before the creation of the Dogme 95 style - was Forrest Gump, with a domestic box-office gross of $329,691,196 and six Academy awards including best director and best picture (imdb.com). Forrest Gump is not a Dogme 95 film, a fact which is observable when you compare it to the ten parameters which define that style.
      The first "Vow of Chastity" states that, "Shooting must be done on location. Props and sets must not be brought in (if a particular prop is necessary for the story, a location must be chosen where this prop is to be found)" (wikipedia.org). The story-line of Forrest Gump begins in the 1950's and progresses through the 60's, 70's, and 80's with fastidious attention to detail in re-creating each decade with accurate props, sets, and dressed locations.
      The second states that, "The sound must never be produced apart from the images or vice versa. (Music must not be used unless it occurs where the scene is being shot)." Forrest Gump relies heavily on music to build dramatic tension as well as to add to the authenticity of the various decades that the characters found themselves in.
      The third states that, "The camera must be a hand-held camera. Any movement or immobility attainable in the hand is permitted. The film must not take place where the camera is standing; filming must take place where the action takes place." In re-creating battle scenes from the Vietnam War, Director Robert Zemeckis utilized helicopter shots to capture scenes of soldiers from above.
      The fourth states that, "The film must be in colour. Special lighting is not acceptable (if there is too little light for exposure the scene must be cut or a single lamp be attached to the camera). Forrest Gump has many scenes that take place at night or indoors which utilize artificial sources of light specifically for production purposes.
      The fifth states that, "Optical work and filters are forbidden." In one scene in Forrest Gump, the title character - played by Tom Hanks - is digitally inserted into preexisting film footage so as to appear to shake hands with president John Kennedy.
      The sixth states that, "The film must not contain superficial action (murders, weapons, etc. must not occur.)" During the portion of Forrest Gump which takes place during the Vietnam War, Gery Sinise's character - Lt. Dan Taylor - has his legs shot off.
      The seventh states that, "Temporal and geographical alienation are forbidden (that is to say that the film takes place here and now)." As already stated, Forrest Gump spans several decades in its timeline.
      The eighth states that, "Genre movies are not acceptable." This is a criteria which Forrest Gump may meet. The film has funny moments but is not a comedy, has war but is not a war movie, and is historical without being a reenactment of any one instance in particular.
      The ninth states that, "The final picture must be transferred to the Academy 35mm film, with an aspect ratio of 4:3, that is, not widescreen. (Originally, the requirement was that the film had to be filmed on Academy 35mm film, but the rule was relaxed to allow low-budget productions.)" Forrest Gump has an aspect ratio of 1:85:1 and many of the special effects were shot and edited digitally.
      The tenth states that, "The director must not be credited." Robert Zemeckis is credited for directing Forrest Gump.
      In making this comparison one can see the way in which films with one set of concerns and production values compare to another set with very different ones. Although the tenets of Dogme 95 may not be the best criteria to judge the "hyper-realness" of an existing film, a system of checks and balances similar to it may be.
      To conclude, the images that consumer culture produces are consumed by individuals and used in the creation of identities. The images of consumer culture are predominantly hyperreal in their nature, and and upon consumption forward the creation of identities that are necessarily hyperreal as well. To avoid the form of social control offered by the simulacrum identity it is of interest to individuals to develop a system of analysis with which to gauge the relative hyper-realness of a given image.

Go on, get out of here. You're Free Now. Go on, GO...

Preface: You know in kids' movies when the kid has to let the animal go back into the wild?
The Text:
The salient point within chapter two of Guy Debord's 1967 Society of the Spectacle can be read within the subtext of aphorism number fifty-three, in which Debord states, "...this project is the society of the spectacle, where the commodity contemplates itself in a world of its own making." What Debord calls into question here is the value of a human life.
Debord establishes earlier in chapter two that within the discourse of the society of the spectacle, the usefulness of a given quantity is explicitly proportional to that quantity's ability to participate within, and thereby perpetuate the discourse of the spectacle. He also establishes that for any "thing" - be it an idea or a solid object - to be of use to the machinations of the spectacle, the qualities of a substance must first be quantified. This quantification serves to transmute the essence of an idea or object into a product: a commodity that fits within the spectacle's discursive specifications. The quantification that Debord concerns himself with throughout Society of the Spectacle, and is specifically addressing in aphorism fifty-three is that of the human as commodity.
The scene is set for the fruition of human reification by the actualizing of Michel Foucault's concept of biopower. When he (Foucault) describes "...an explosion of numerous and diverse techniques for achieving the subjugations of bodies and the control of populations..." (Foucault, 140) Foucault is describing a tactic of power that politically quantifies the human body. This alchemy of discourse is a method employed by the society of the spectacle which Debord specifically names in aphorism forty-two when he says, "...domination is broken down into further specialties such as sociology, applied psychology, cybernetics, and semiology..."
These institutions, like the people that fill them, are products of the culture that produced them. Debord identifies these quantifiers of human life and consciousness as the internal way in which the society of the spectacle regulates its participants á la biopolitics.
The total commodification of human life that Debord identifies as the final expression of the spectacle is taken one step further by Jonathan Crarcy within his text Techniques of the Observer. Cracry first identifies that despite culture producing the way which one experiences the world, as human beings our primary form for perceiving objective reality is through sight. Historically, Crarcy argues, seeing has been believing. Humanity has evolved with the implicit constant that to see something - an object or an event - is to experience the fact of that things existence objectively.
Crarcy believes that this ability to implicitly trust the world we see in everyday life will soon be a thing of the past. When he states that, "... the historically important functions of the human eye are being supplanted by practices in which visual images no longer have any reference to the position of an observer in a 'real,' optically perceived world..." (Crarcy, 2) he is not alluding to the suspension of disbelief that one engages in when reading a novel, or the consensual illusion entered within the walls of a movie theatre. Instead Crarcy refers to the creation of an environment that we interpret as reality, but has never, and could never exist in any physical form: cyberspace. The acceptance of imagery that only exists in a digital, non-real space is a concern for Crarcy because it effectively quantifies reality.
The codification of experienced reality into "... millions of bits of electronic mathematical data..." that Crarcy is describing seems to breach the last bastion of human experience that until the "digital revolution" had been out of reach for assimilation into the discourse of the spectacle. To appreciate the potentiality that Crarcy envisions for cyberspace, first imagine an Appalachian coal-mining town at the turn of the twentieth century.
Commonly referred to as "company towns", these communities were owned in totality by a given coal company. Employees labored in the company mine, bought company food from the company store with company money that they also used to pay for their company house situated on company land. Children went to company schools and parents filled their company cars at the company service-station.
Company Towns were in effect a precursory microcosm of what Guy Debord would later describe as the society of the spectacle. The spectacle being the coal company and the society - the coal miners - being the entire world. Debord's vision of a global economy beholden to the doctrines of reification and total commodity that extends into all aspects of human life in the same way that coal companies dominated the lives of their employees. However, the spectacle as described by Debord was not yet a closed system. The global commodification of resources - vegetable, animal, mineral, and ontological - into the cultural product of the spectacle still had gaps and inconsistencies in 1967.
What Crarcy is describing "... [an] equivalent sensation and stimuli that have no reference to a spatial location..." (Crarcy, 24) is the effort of the system to close itself. Debord related a future history that warned where we were headed, Crarcy is describing the way in which we have gotten there.
The value of human life that Guy Debord is concerned with within Society of the Spectacle focuses on the quantitative - or monetary - value of a person's labor within a system that equates value with the perpetuation of the system. The quantitative ubiquity of the cultural object designated as "money" confers power through perceived value into a system that, once adopted, required its participants to perpetuate.
However, not all action in the system described by Debord engage - and by definition - perpetuated the system. An individual may have been produced by and exist in relation to the spectacle, but the singular act of existence does not implicitly engage with the spectacle directly. This is where Crarcy's admonition of the quantification of reality reminds one that the spectacle, as an expression of power, has only grown more complex since Debord gave it a name in 1967.
Crarcy's premonition of an augmented, codified, and quantified reality turns the very act of existing into a commodity. This closing of the system makes the participants completely beholden to the discourse of power and effectively neuters any potential for true resistance. If the spectacle can produce a closed system in which the world we experience in real time is totally physically constructed by the discourse of power, the resultant commodity will be denied even self-contemplation.


1. Crarcy, Jonathan (1990) "Techniques of the Observer." MIT Press: Boston, MA, 1992.
2. Debord, Guy (1967) "The Society of the Spectacle." Rebel Press: London, 2004.
3. Foucault, Michel (1984) "The History of Sexuality Vol.1: The Will to Knowledge." Penguin Books: London, 1998.