Ghosts of the Tortured Past: Foucauldian Themes in “An Eddy on the Floor”
Document Type
Oral Presentation
Campus where you would like to present
Ellensburg
Event Website
https://digitalcommons.cwu.edu/source
Start Date
15-5-2019
End Date
15-5-2019
Abstract
his paper argues that fictional literary texts, especially obscure ones, can function as windows into history much the same as classic historical documents. In this case, Bernard Capes’ ghost story “An Eddy on the Floor” shows the reader firsthand how the penal landscape of the 17th-19th centuries was changing from one based off of corporal punishment to one of spiritual reform, coinciding with a rise in idealism more generally, hence the ghost story format, a very popular medium of the time. These ideas are placed into context via Michel Foucault's theories outlined in Discipline and Punish: Birth of the Prison, where he observes how, throughout the Georgian-Victorian eras, punishment morphed from that of the body as public spectacle to that of the mind being reformed behind closed doors. In short, the paper examines how his ideas of power and knowledge which completely altered the prison and reformatory systems can be found in literary texts that were being written at the time of these changes. Finally, the possibility of a value-judgment of these changes is speculated upon.
Recommended Citation
Jelinek, Benjamin, "Ghosts of the Tortured Past: Foucauldian Themes in “An Eddy on the Floor”" (2019). Symposium Of University Research and Creative Expression (SOURCE). 22.
https://digitalcommons.cwu.edu/source/2019/Oralpres/22
Department/Program
English
Ghosts of the Tortured Past: Foucauldian Themes in “An Eddy on the Floor”
Ellensburg
his paper argues that fictional literary texts, especially obscure ones, can function as windows into history much the same as classic historical documents. In this case, Bernard Capes’ ghost story “An Eddy on the Floor” shows the reader firsthand how the penal landscape of the 17th-19th centuries was changing from one based off of corporal punishment to one of spiritual reform, coinciding with a rise in idealism more generally, hence the ghost story format, a very popular medium of the time. These ideas are placed into context via Michel Foucault's theories outlined in Discipline and Punish: Birth of the Prison, where he observes how, throughout the Georgian-Victorian eras, punishment morphed from that of the body as public spectacle to that of the mind being reformed behind closed doors. In short, the paper examines how his ideas of power and knowledge which completely altered the prison and reformatory systems can be found in literary texts that were being written at the time of these changes. Finally, the possibility of a value-judgment of these changes is speculated upon.
https://digitalcommons.cwu.edu/source/2019/Oralpres/22
Faculty Mentor(s)
Barry Shelton