Thanks to Nate for the excerpt from Foucault´s interview, giving me meaning
for the term "Fouclaultian gaze." I can only imagine that he (Fouclault,
that is) was thinking that this type of control can be similarly economical
and efficient in the institurionalized control practices of schools,
especially given the quote "to put an overseer in the tower and place in
each of the cells a lunatic, a patient, a convict, or a schoolboy."
I am still processing the connection between Foucaultian gaze and ADHD
medical discourse...is the argument then that the way ADHD is diagnosed,
kind of exposed and imbued with a sense of reality as it is constructed as a
medical reality, results in a type of relatively simple and economical
control, analgous to the institutional architecture designed to ensure that
everyone (well, at least the ones that don´t fit) is exposed, observed?
And maybe this can be applied to other mental health-type diagnoses (those
that employ, as described by Virginia, the DSM-IV manual.) I have always
been fascinated by the diagnosis of mental illness by the DSM manuals (I
remember when it was just III). I used to work in a group home with
adolescents with "behavior disorders." To some extent, they went through
some of the things described in Virginia´s paper...relief at being
diagnosed, issues of moral culpability (I used to be a delinquient but now I
have borderline personality disorder). And for their family and teachers,
maybe some mixture of relief and guilt at the justification the label
offered for removing them from the home and school entirely.
Anotehr side effect of diagnosis in this case was that their rights of
privacy and confidentiality were removed in kind of a striking way. All the
counselors and case workers were required to write daily, weekly, and
monthly "progress notes." These were recorded in a big red book and read by
all the staff, but interestingly hidden from the client (that was the term
we used, to make ourselves feel better I think that we were not saying
"patient" like the mental hopsitals did.) And I remember that when one of
our clients was particularly upset about this idea, that his records were
open to all staff yet closed to him, the staff considered him to be
untrusting and resistant. But I think this relates to the gaze, because the
staff seem to say to the client "we can all see you, we are all watching you
and sharing notes, and you can not even know what we see of you." Wierd, I
think.
By the way, thanks, John, for pointing out the difference between glaze and
gaze. I must have been fantasizing about doughnuts again...
Renée
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