Fashioning the Body: Versions of the Citizen, the Self, and the Subject

Foucault’s philosophy about the importance of confession in the West is completely fascinating. I have never considered this, even though the evidence that we are indeed a confessional society is everywhere. Would talk shows even be entertaining without confessions or self-help advice for those who are coming to terms with their innermost desires? I don’t think so.  It seems as though everyone is trying to “find” themselves, and many believe that the truth to one’s being is buried deep inside and must be uncovered in order to live one’s life to its fullest potential. Dr. Phil and other therapists make tons of money by listening to people confess their fears, dreams and desires and interpreting them in order to help the person in question come to terms with their existence.

 The difference between the Occident and the Oriental interest me, especially in relation to this topic. I just happened to be reading The Art of Happiness by The Dalai Lama. He speaks on what he believes to be the main psychological difference between the East and the West.

It seems as though people of the West use the act of confession to relieve the tension we accumulate because of our fear of the unexplainable, especially in relation to emotions and desires. It does seem as though we live by the clock, and as time seeps through our fingers we are left feeling anxiety due to our lack of self-knowledge. This is why psychological therapy is so important in Western society. I never would have thought of these obvious cultural factors had I not read Foucault’s thoughts on the Western obsession with confession.

“We must not forget that the psychological, psychiatric, medical category of homosexuality was constituted from the moment it was characterized-Westphal’s famous article of 1870 on “contrary sexual sensations” can stand as its date of birth- less by a type of sexual relations than by a certain quality of sexual sensibility, a certain way of inverting the masculine and feminine in oneself…the homosexual was now a species,” (43).

Why does American culture in many ways still analyze homosexuals with the antiquated Westphal theory?  Perhaps one reason is because many Americans find cliché feminine gay men and masculine lesbian women to be novelties, useful in humor and entertainment. Examples including Family Guy, Will and Grace, and Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, often appeal to Americans with stereo-typical “gay” antics. I admit that I have found these shows funny, and that many of these shows help to shape my opinions of homosexual people as a teenager.

“It is possible that the West has not been capable of inventing any new pleasures, and it has doubtless not discovered any original vices. But it has defined new rules for the game of powers and pleasures,” (48).

Isn’t the act of a confessing a pleasure which the West invented? Confession is a form of release for the one confessing and is often a vicarious pleasure for the one who is listening. Occidental people get much joy out of confessional gossip. For example, a confessor often hears in reply to one's sexual confession statements and qustions such as, “You slept with her/him! What was it like? How do you feel about this now?”  The listener often digs deeper into the subject of the confession in order to satisfy one’s curiosity. In this way, the process of confessing and the process of listening to a confession are forms of pleasure in Western societies. That is why I disagree with Foucault when he states that the West may not have invented new forms of pleasure.

The Evergreen State College smoking tent is a physical place where human students, faculty and visitors go to inhale smoke from cylinder consisting of a dried plant called tobacco rolled in paper. This object is called a cigarette. These people are labeled “smokers” and they are isolated to “designated smoking areas” as signs clearly state around the Evergreen education facilities. My fellow anthropologists and I chose to study the smoking tent located outside of the COM building.

            This area is called the smoking tent because there is a “tent,” or shelter, in this location. The tent consists of metal bars that form an exposed square base and these bars support a blue tarp that begins about six feet from the base of the support bars.  The blue tarp is formed in the shape of a pyramid by metal bars. This served the purpose of sheltering smokers from rain. The tarp does not prevent wind and extreme temperatures from affecting the smokers. This was obvious when we arrived at the tent and no people were standing under it. Ten smokers were, however, standing 10-25 feet away from the tent in patches of sunlight that penetrated through the dense trees. These people were obviously breaking the “designated smoking area” boundaries, as specified by the signs. However, no authority figures corrected the smokers on their breach of regulated campus rules.

 It is also important to note that the tent can only comfortably fit 10-12 people in the event of rain. This could be a problem, especially when we observed 39 smokers using the facility during a 23 minute period.  There is also a bench in the smoking tent which is the only designated place for smokers to sit. The bench can fit 4 people and we failed observed more than two people sitting on the bench at one time. Some smokers who needed to sit placed themselves on the cement ground or on the stairs located near the tent.