To New BeginningS
Artwork By: Hyeri Jeong
June, a month of transition.
When I think of June, I think of the official start of summer. I think of the dew on the trees, the coniferous leaves blowing in the wind, and the suburban sounds of children running amok. I think of the impending pressure to change. To do something. After all, it's halfway through the year, and goals were made back in January. I’m not exactly sure when June, with its bright sunshine and growing dandelions, became a month of exhaustion. I assume it was around the same time that Twinkies started tasting dull and the bright tint surrounding life began to diminish.
June became a month of scrolling on LinkedIn and seeing friends, acquaintances, and strangers making something of their lives. A month of hustling. A month of contradiction, where joy lies in the familiar feeling of burnout, and depression lies in mindlessly changing the TV channel. A month of measurement. A month of obsessively checking progress, of comparing the now to the then.
A month of constant movement.
Keep going. Don’t stop to think, not even to breathe. Run, don’t walk. If you take a moment to just stop, that moment might last forever and you may never move again.
That fear of being left behind, of failure, of crushing disappointment, of eventual bitterness and regret in old age, keeps me moving. Keeps me docile.
It was Michel Foucault, a French philosopher, who coined the term “docile bodies”. I learned of it in my philosophy class on a random Tuesday afternoon, and ever since, the topic stuck with me. That class we discussed the hierarchical structure that society is built on and the manner in which bodies are objected to discipline through power. Just another ordinary class on existential dread, really.
Foucault writes,
“A body is docile that may be subjected, used, transformed, and improved” (Foucault, Discipline and Punish, 136).
To be “docile,” the body must be not only obedient, but also efficient and useful. Foucault examines how power underpins disciplinary society, tracing the shift from overt displays of dominance over the body to the more subtle forms of control that prevail today. These disciplinary systems perpetuate power by conditioning individuals to behave in specific ways through routine and surveillance, embedding themselves within our institutions from education and prison systems to hospitals, workplaces, and even private life.
From what I understand, the price of discipline? Freedom.
I remember scrambling to understand Foucault then, and completely missing the point about free-will and individuality that my professor kept yapping about.
However, now in June, I understand it more than ever.
I feel my individuality slowly fading as I succumb to the will of others, even though I’m not entirely sure who, or what, I’m surrendering to. More importantly, despite having endless options and paths open for me, it is the suffocating lack of control towards my existence that I fixate on.
There is an invisible pull drawing me toward the path of least resistance; to behave a certain way, to be useful, to become, as Foucault puts it, docile.
I am but a cog in a grander machine. I submit to the will of another under the illusion that it is my choice. I move because I am told. To stop would be catastrophic; to move is survival.
So, now what?
Maybe June, with its restless mornings, can also be a month of new beginnings. So, despite feeling powerless, I still resist, trying to find and understand my voice amidst the sea of societal expectations threatening to drown me.
xoxo,
Khushi Kumari
Hey, if you liked this and want to dive deeper into Foucault, stay tuned for more reflections on Docile Bodies. This is just the beginning. Thanks for reading!!
Sources:
Michel Foucault, “Docile Bodies”, in Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison, trans. Alan Sheridan (Vintage Books 1995), pp. 135-169.
