About this title: A history of the development of the science of penology in the West. Foucault, a celebrated French scholar and former professor at the College de France, examines the shift in Western attitudes towards criminal justice and punishment, tracing their shift from an emphasis upon divine justice and retribution in the Middle Ages to the faith in rehabilitation that reached its height in the 19th and early-20th centuries.
Note: This is a general synopsis. Each listing is described below.
Edition: Reprint.
Binding: Trade paperback
Publisher: Vintage Books USA, New York, New York
Date Published: 1977
ISBN-13:9780679752554ISBN:0679752552
Description: Very good. No dust jacket as issued. No creases to the spine. A nice copy. No notes to the text. Trade paperback (US). Glued binding. 333 p. Contains: Illustrations. Audience: General/trade. read more
Description: Very Good. Great condition for a used book! Minimal wear. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy! read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Vintage Books, New York, New York, U.S.A.
Date Published: 1995
ISBN-13:9780679752554ISBN:0679752552
Description: Near Fine. 8vo. Near fine, the book itself is not exactly straight (much like Foucault himself); it suffers from a peculiar backwards curve as though all the pages at once were slightly kinked; other than that the only problems are standard shelfwear and a subtle crease on the front cover. read more
Binding: Soft Pictoral Cover
Publisher: Vintage Books, New York, New York, U.S.A.
Date Published: 1995
ISBN-13:9780679752554ISBN:0679752552
Description: Good. 8vo-over 7¾"-9¾" tall. Barely two hundred and fifty years ago a man condemned of attempting to assassinate the King of France was drawn and quartered in a grisly spectacle that suggested an unmediated duel between the violence of the criminal and the violence of the state. This groundbreaking book by the most influential philosopher since Sartre compels us to reevaluate our assumptions about all the ensuing reforms in the penal institutions of the West. 333 pgs. with notes, bibliography, ... read more
Binding: Trade Paperback
Publisher: Vintage Books, New York, New York, U.S.A.
Date Published: 1977
ISBN-13:9780679752554ISBN:0679752552
Description: Very Good. 8vo-over 7¾"-9¾" tall. This groundbreaking book by the most influential philosopher since Sartre compels us to reevaluate our assumptions about all the ensuing reforms in the penal institutions of the West. 330pages including bibliography and notes. read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Vintage
Date Published: 1995
ISBN-13:9780679752554ISBN:0679752552
Description: Good. --All NEW items are exactly as provided by the publisher. All USED items are in Good condition or better, and copies may contain store stickers, highlighting, etc from normal use by previous owner(s). One-time use supplements (e.g., access codes, tear-out flash cards, reference cards, etc) provided with new copies are NOT guaranteed. --Professional booksellers: inquiries always welcome. read more
"This was my first exposure to Michel Foucault. I'm not sure whether it is the fault of the translator or not, but I found Foucault's prose to be quite dense and elliptical at times, to the degree that it may have contributed to the fleeting impression this work left on me. It was interesting, and presented a view on the evolution of criminal punishment that I hadn't considered in such a light before; I find, however, that much of it has already slipped away from memory.
The principal thrust of the book is to present a view on how the punishment of felon's has evolved in western society from brutal, pain-filled tortures and executions meant to punish the victim for their effrontery to the monarch - stressing a personal offense on the part of the transgressor - to a very systematic and abstract approach meant to remove the convict from society and allow them to be kept under observation, even as society itself comes to accept that the eyes of the state are on it at all times and hence modifies its behavior accordingly. Much of the latter is presented through a very interesting treatise on Jeremy Bentham's Panopticon, an early prison design in which all of the prisoner's cells were visible from a central hub - the inmates couldn't see inside this centre, so they never knew when they were being watched, and thus came to expect that at any given moment they were under observation.
An educational and interesting book, if somewhat inaccessible. I'll read more Foucault in the future - I just won't be in any rush to do so."
"Surveiller et Punir as it is originally its title in French, Discipline and Punish is such an interesting book which takes back again to the origines of such and interesting point in human history: the birth of prison, surveillance and punishment. Foucault with his archeological persistent method leads us to peek at the very begining of human subordination, one sided-mastery and big-brotherness in a very modern sense.I remember that I finished the last pages in this interesting book while listening to the Beatles song Hey Jude!!"
"God, Foucault is so intense. I read this at university, and now that I think of it, I probably didn't end up reading the whole thing. I really do appreciate reading Foucault itself, not an interpretation of his stuff, but it's very long and dense and requires a level of concentration that most of my life does not demand; I am therefore unpracticed and inept.
The point of this review is that even if you read just a few chapters of this, it will be intellectually edifying. And I mean it will be mind-altering, forever. You will have to consider perspectives never before considered, and your opinions and feelings will be therefore be permanently changed. Now Foucault has become a part of me, although I can't say right now (without re-reading) where he ends and I begin.
(I think I'll use this review for my other Foucault read.)"
"Analysis of power relationships and how social structures are created and modified to maintain them. While about prison, punishment and torture on one level it is just as fundamental in its discussion of the equations of control and dominance of populations, using examples from throughout society such as the architecture of hospitals, the design of military bases and how prisons are laid out.
The underpinnings of captitalist production, taken for granted by those they most effect, are shown to be echoed in the organization of schools and treatment of the very ill."
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