Representing the Boarding Body Discourse Power and the Snowboarding Media part 2 Michel Foucault 1926 1984 Brilliant international thinker blurred boundaries between disciplines theory and practice Disrupted fundamental Western truths General overview of Foucault in sport studies Calls attention to the way objects subjects and truth are produced by the interrelation of language social institutions and power Paraphrased from M M Fulkerson and S J Dunlap Introduction Michel Foucault in Graham Ward pp 116 123 Appignanesi and C Garratt Introducing Postmodernism pp 82 83 86 87 Foucault pointed out knowledges and power which somehow come to dominate historical eras He asked what counts as knowledge and truth and what doesn t AND He focused on how power molds everyone not only its victims involved in its exercise Power cannot only be coercive It also has to be productive and enabling Power would be a fragile thing if its only function were to repress Power is in the texture of our lives we live it rather than have it Paraphrased and quoted from Michel Foucault Discipline and Punish 1977 Foucault investigated processes that create the other that define and control pathology that keep people in society under control Snowboarders wait in line for their turn to hit the jumps in the terrain park at Breckenridge Foucault explored the idea of the panopticon Panopticon Building divided into cells At the center of the cells is a tower in which is placed a supervisor who cannot be seen by the occupants of the cells windows in which supervisor can see in full lighting and the eye of a supervisor Panopticon The societal idea of panopticism developed from real problems of disease and evil against an extraordinary evil power is mobilized Prisons schools hospitals factories universities Prisoners students patients workers etc can be judged continuously their behavior altered Supervisors of bodies also such as nurses doctors teachers coaches etc Continued The panopticon as marvelous machine supervisor is unverifiable induces in the inmate a state of consciousness and permanent visibility that assures the functioning of power p 65 panopticon In its many variations it is a type of location of bodies in space of distribution of individuals in relation to one another of hierarchical organization or disposition of centers and channels of power of definition of the instruments and modes of intervention of power which can be implemented An event in the history of the human mind That the panopticon has given rise to many variations projected and realized is evidence of the imaginary intensity that it has possessed in modernity We are in a panoptic machine Modern society For Foucault our society is one of surveillance of the panoptic machine thus the exchange and circulation of images and signs define and regiment the body Foucault s five aspects of power Thorpe pp 86 87 1 Power is everywhere omnipresent 2 Power encompasses relations between people acting upon the actions of another not directly on the person peer pressure 3 Power is exercised only over free subjects and only insofar as they are free buying decisions 4 Power regulates but it may also foster creativity affect e g enjoyment in work 5 Where there is power there is resistance e g voicing concerns in editorials Niche media Produce forms of cultural knowledge and offer affective experiences p 87 Contribute to classifying distributing and ordering of particular discourses in snowboarding culture p 89 e g whiteness Contribute to producing regimes of truth e g who speaks is seen and who is not Whiskey Videos Burton Street Float Micro Media Low circulating target specific groups Important for organizing culture at local level Often a place where snowboarders can express their angst at other mass or niche forms of snowboarding media p 81 http www snowboardingforum com http www angrysnowboarder com themainstream media still doesnt get it http abcnews go com GMA video riskymaneuver lands snowboarder coma 9479741 http www snowsphere com other news newssnowboarder mag army ads spark icelandicwrath Femininity Mass and niche media create and recreate multiple discourses of female snowboarders How do snowboarders read and sometimes resist different portrayals of female boarding bodies p 91 Some scholars are critical of women s subordination in sport as reflected in how female athletes bodies are a source of oppression as they are forced to appropriately present themselves via body regimes and acceptable forms of femininity labeled the female apologetic Female apologetic women who challenge traditional notions of masculinity such as in sport participation also apologize symbolically culturally by emphasizing traditional notions of their femininity Various discourses inform women s snowboarding practices and snowboarding bodies Heterosexual and traditional femininity discourse powerful in mainstream media Skill privileged over gender in niche media Historical context and age of participant consumer may matter Feminist movement history First wave 1848 1920s women s suffrage Second wave 1960s 1980s adversarial radical struggle for equal rights and elimination of traditional sex roles Third wave 1990s expand understandings of gender and sexuality girl power Fourth wave create transform new ways of being Nostalgia for traditional sex roles See Thorpe pp 274 275 Do discourses of femininity have a normalizing effect on female snowboarders producing docile bodies p 99 technologies of the self No coherent snowboarding femininity Is snowboarding culture unique in comparison to traditional team sports such as basketball http www mnvideovault org index php id 255 06 select index 0 popup yes 0 Critical self reflexive individual questions what seems natural and inevitable in his her identity create new experiences possibility of transgression paraphrased from p 102